~Tirtha Shrestha~
Translator : Ganesh Poudel
You don’t have smell,
But you are not plastic, I know.
Dahlia, you Lahure flower !
I do remember to see you, Lahure flower,
my wounded husband to death.
And I do remember somehow till date
The letter wrapped with Kancho Dhago,
His pension that smells me with his blood,
And my own life, I remember,
That survives with the very pension.
My husband’s lifelong earning
that hides his widow’s head under its roof
And you bloom shamelessly,
In the yard facing its door !
Dahlia, you Lahure flower.
How much you add insult to injury?
Would you let it go, you Lahure flower?
It’s been long, life itself is a wound.
It’s been long, life itself is a pain.
Would you leave me to rest you Lahure flower ?
I want to turn the layers of my wound
To change the history of treaties
I want sooth myself to the wounds
To stop the trade of the blood
I want to tear-throw that demon
Black page of this history
Wait,
Dahlia, you Lahure flower!
I want to change your name.
FOOTNOTES:
1. Lahure : (in Nepali) The Gurkha Soldiers who were supposed to have brought Dahlia flower to Nepal. The flower is called Lahure in Nepal.
2. Kancho Dhago : Raw Cotton Thread is said as Kancho Dhago in Nepali. It is tied around an envelope to deliver message of someone’s death. Hence is symbolic to family member’s death in some strand land.
3. History of Treaties : Reference to various treaties between Nepal and British-India regarding the recruitment of Gurkha youths in their regiments after Anglo-Nepal War (1814 – 1816)
(युवा साहित्यकारलेखक गनेस पौडेलले अनुवाद गरेको कवि तीर्थ श्रेष्ठको चर्चित कविता ‘लाहुरे फूल, म तिम्रो नाम फेर्न चाहन्छु’ पौडेलको फेसबुकबाट साभार)
(स्रोत : Sunakhari.com )
