The fluctuations of your light turn the chisel – Poems by Saikat Sarkar, trans. Hindol Ganguly

 

Subway

 

Left for so many days while writing the essence

You didn’t come back yet

Here calm words, eternity lay scattered

Like thatch nestled with absolute diligence

These phrases can’t be expressed in one word

Still, if some shortcut remains as shelter

I won’t consider them an alternative to the distance

 

 

Fluffed rice*

 

Drenching has made light become static

Like helpless camphor, fire and vanity have disappeared

Even today I sense a smell of envy while opening your diary

This furious soil has been soaked

Autographs are decaying after giving you their bark

How many generations become waves, turn old…

& you laid cultivation besides some pennies

[Usually termed ‘Khai’ in Bengali, there is a tradition of scattering fluffed rice on someone’s path to crematorium]

 

 

David’s sadness

 

I can see ice in roses

In sacrifice and in fire

I am hearing leery metallic forms of armor

Using me as a shield everyday

 

You have seen only soil turn into soil

Only its maternal virtues erode

Some soil left, with the surety of becoming the Grand Canyon

 

If I keep them very close to my chest

The fluctuations of your light turn the chisel

Before becoming precisely a sculpture

Once more I wish to be gentle, O lord

Once more…

 

 

Ballads for almighty – 3

 

The cot is filled with the smell of Neem

Unsolicited Peepul grown within two words

Sound of folding Palm-leaf manuscripts in the gloom of bricks

There are no deeds for sound

 

At dusk, Gautam* comes and stands by holding the pole

Waves rise in the unlit sanctum

Only he never tells the path to salvation

[Gautam – Another name of Buddha]

 

 

Written from Gompas – 1

 

A few gnarled faces

The hymns of lamas can be heard from the shrine right now

Transcendental language will surround us like fascicle of rubicund poems

 

I have leaned on the Gompa shoving the heat of restraint

The hills too have been submerged into the colour covered by jeweled lotus

 

If dark, cruel death comes, they won’t let it turn away

Lighting incenses, will suddenly revolve the luminous prayer wheel

[In Buddhism, there is a concept of Manipadma (Jeweled lotus). Each petal of the flower represents different wisdom (like precious jewel) obtained by Buddha, & the flower itself is the collection of all his wisdoms]

 

 

Written from Gompas – 2

 

That instrument by which you could never be tinkled

That day when the pebble couldn’t get you near the hilly spring

That glass like chromatic fragments

Falling into your chignon from the pinnacle of the monastery

Those lights & shades went pouring the mist on your concealment

 

All their paths welcome me

Keep intertwined all unerring root-bridges with disillusioned radicles

 

 

 

Saikat Sarkar was born in 1993, in a suburb of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. He earned his Master’s degree in Bengali Literature from Jadavpur University and has been writing poetry since his school days.  He has two poetry collections to his credit, Godhulir Paracetamol  (2017), To To Biography (2017). Photography and designing book covers are his other areas of interest.

 

 

 

 

 

Hindol Ganguly is a reader, writer & translator. He earned a Master’s Degree in Statistics & works in Deloitte India as a Senior Data Science consultant. Hindol’s writings & translations have been published in several magazines. Recently he has completed an 18 month long translation project on Greek poetry during Austerity for Aparjan magazine. He translated Nobel laureate West Indian poet Derek Walcott’s poems for the magazine KabitaDihi. He likes trekking, photography, cooking & sports.