~Krishna Bhushan Bal~
Trans : Mahesh Paudyal ‘Prarambha’
A moon of creativity went, passing us, just now,
an air of zeal was discarded on the river bank, just now.
A mere, feeble town writhes with a crowd of dead bodies
the roads are silent with void stepping of empty feet
history stuck there,
we stuck there with it,
to know if the rivers are asleep or awake, we thrust in a burning log,
and strolled from towns and countries
to see if they are asleep or awake
by the time we knew this, we had ourselves been flown afar,
and when we learnt them in detail, we were caught in a mudslide,
history stopped there,
many of us regressed.
We, with smolders of Sagauli treaty,
we, the witness to the denial of cremation-bank to Bhimsen’s body
we, cursed by the chaste godmother,
how long can a candle, canopied by a cold sky, keep burning?
Who knows when the trees, along the Arun bank, will slip and fall?
Just now, a jackal unfeathered a cock, crowing to the ushering morn.
Just now, the fog eclipsed the sun that appeared in the east with the dawn.
Geography has always cheated us;
we ourselves cheated history!
(Source : English Samakalinsahitya)
