Bruised, but not Broken (poems) – 27. Mother Earth

Bruised, but not Broken (poems)

-Challapalli Swarooparani 

27. Mother Earth

I declare this land is mine
And cattiest serpents hiss furiously
I till my land
And it crawls around me,
This Anaconda of caste and
Crushes my frame.

If we beseech them
And not the waters
Village-lakes would overflow with
Our blood.

Have you ever heard of such a thing?
For acquiring a chunk of land
Bhayyalal of Khairlanji’s wife and children
Were brutally slain
Sacrificed at the altar of the
Caste-bourgeoisie!

Deaths that still resound in our ears
Whenever we assert our human-hood.

They demand our self-respect as tax
Their egoism is forever hungry
And will not rest
Till they disrobe
The esteem, which
Our slum that has come of age
Sustains.

I am no motherland
To die of hunger
Nor a mother-tongue
That shall remain thirsty forever.

I am Mother-earth
Who tends her garden-child
With sweat
And marks as mine
This soil.

This soil belongs to me!
As for proof ―
Ask this land
That has grown fat on my blood!
And the mysteries of
Our bondage
Held captive in
Subterranean chambers
Shall slowly unravel!

(Telugu: “Mattitally”, translated by N. R.Tapaswi and published on Face Book Timeline of the author.)

*****

(To be continued-)

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Challapalli Swaroopa Rani

Challapalli Swaroopa Rani hails from a village, Pyaparru, Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh. She is one of the five daughters of Mariyamma and Mantraiah. Went to Govt school in her place, completed her college at Guntur, the District head quarters. Then shifted to Hyderabad Central University and involved in student politics as a founder member of Ambedkar Student’s Association. She had her master’s in History & Archaeology, M.Phil in Medieval History and Ph. D in Regional Studies. Swaroopa has obtained Gold Medal in her Masters Examinations. She has got her first recruitment as Asst. Professor in History at Potti Sriramulu Telugu University, Srisailam and got selected as Associate Professor in Buddhist Studies in Acharya Nagarjuna University, Guntur. She lives in Vijayawada. Presently she is a Professor of Buddhist Studies and Director, Center for Women’s Studies in the same University. She is specialized in studies on Buddhism, Caste, Religion, Gender, Tribal Studies, People’s Culture and Literature.

Swaroopa Rani is poet, story writer, columnist and free lance Journalist. She is known activist and writer. She has started writing poetry during her college days on general aspects and shifted to write political issues of Dalits, Adivasis and Women. Swaroopa has published four books on theory(English and Telugu) and two anthologies(Telugu) and almost 100 articles in different journals. She has organized ten National and International Conferences and attended more than 100 seminars and conferences.  Swaroopa’s poetry is well received by the readers and her poetry is included in many collections and got translated into English, Hindi, Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam. Academic research is being carried on her works and her poetry is prescribed in curriculum at Graduation and Post-Graduation level.