❈ ❈ ❈
You Will Not Speak
– Parul Khakhar
The pain will get unbearable, but you will not speak;
Even if your heart will scream, you will not speak
They’ll force you to slash your tongue and keep it out of sight
Many more will cheer you, but you will not speak
Open those thick volumes of history and do reflect:
Those who speak out have been shot, so you will not speak
Maybe you will sell cherries by speaking out more often
But it is wiser not to talk, so you will not speak
The old rules of your lineage say: silence is so golden
Torch-bearers have made that call, and you will not speak
Not one, nor few, but millions more will stand along your side
Remember their condition, though; that you will not speak
If citizens who can’t listen host a feast for the truth
And implore you to repeat; still you will not speak
(Parul Khakhar, an ordinary homemaker from a simple family in Gujarat, writes poems in Gujarati language, especially devotional poems of Radha-Krishna. Recently, when the bodies of people dying of COVID were found floating in the Ganga, it pained her so much that she wrote her now viral 14-line poem titled ‘Shav Vahini Ganga’ and shared it on her social media account. In just 48 hours, 28 thousand abusive-abusive comments were received on social media.Over one lakh people have shared this poem on their social media accounts. Now the poem is being translated into Assamese, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Bhojpuri, English, Bengali and other languages. We have published her poem in Janata Weekly in an earlier issue. As a kind of sequel to this poem, she wrote the poem being published here, ‘You Will Not Speak’. This poem first appeared in Nireekshak (The Observer) and has been translated into English by Salil Tripathi.)
❈ ❈ ❈
One Day I Saw My Girl
– Siddalingaiah
Night before the murder, the sun and the moon
Were packed away in a money chest
Stuffing the Indian flag into her mouth
They wrested her speech away
Tens of men rushed in with swords flashing
And held her aloft like a bounty
She wanted to spit on their faces
But they had no faces
As if the force of seven seas had hit her
The lechers’ chains shackled her
Struggling against the hunters’ net hurled at her
She vanished behind the guarding torches
Though her tears flowed in torrents
The hundred thirsty tongues were not quenched
The banks of the river were strewn with chunks of flesh
Her clothes were ripped to rags
In that steely embrace the tendrils of her life
Gushed out blood copiously on to the earth
The monsters of darkness wagered on
A game of marbles with her eyeballs
They dangled her tali, shrieked drunkenly
At the price they got from the merchant
They crushed the petals of her body one by one
And carried her to who knows where?
I looked at my girl one day
I saw myself in a mirror
Her face an anthill, a red cobra atop
Swaying with its raised hood unfurled
In her tear-dry eyes had sprouted
Shiny daggers rising skywards
Ganga-Yamuna streamed red in her black body
Her mouth was filled with fire
In the village hedge a viper at res
Its whole body blotched with disease
Wherever I look, I see tigers, lions, leopards
Which beast ripped apart my girl’s body?
Trees and boulders are on their feet
Whose voice is filling up the sky?
On the streets of India
Silver daggers are marching
Rags drenched in blood
Are taken out in a procession
(An iconic figure in the protest culture of Karnataka, Siddalingaiah Devaiah (1954, Bangalore) is considered to be one of the writers who launched dalit literature in Kannada in the 1970s. A founder member of the Karnataka Dalit Sangharsha Samiti, he has inspired generations of dalits and other oppressed through his poetry and his iconic protest songs have been an integral part of the protest culture of Karnataka. For nearly 5 decades now, Siddalingaiah’s poems continue to be a burning critique of the patriarchal caste system.This poem has been translated into English by Kamalakar Bhat.)
❈ ❈ ❈
A Spark
– Shridhar Nandedkar
Why does this text of harmony
prick you?
Never forget:
Even the song of a caged bird
can spread all over the world
like wildfire.
That dry straw in its beak
may be for a nest.
But what you do
lights the spark, sets it ablaze.
It’s not the size of the chest
that makes a man.
Crocodile tears
do not show sensitivity.
It is what you and I feel for the sick bird.
The song of the bird
which you have caged
is deeply rooted in our throats.
Yes, people take care of an artist.
The powerful need bards
to speak and sing about them.
Feel the changing direction of the wind.
Open the door of the cage.
Else take care of your coat
designed in narcissist letters of gold
A spark becomes a wildfire very quickly.
(Shridhar Nandedkar is an eminent Marathi poet, editor, translator. He teaches English and currently resides in Aurangabad, Maharashtra. Translated into English by Dileep V. Chavan, who teaches English language and literature, writes columns for newspapers and translates poetry and prose from/into English, Marathi and Hindi.)
(All poems, courtesy: Indian Cultural Forum.)
