Tempest of time (poems)
-Kondapalli Niharini
Translated by Elanaaga
29. Flower-like Shelves
Yes, what you heard is right
They are flower-like shelves
Don’t detain them.
Don’t tie her in a work shed
with the strings of your ego,
for she will become the answer
to all your questions if detained.
If you want you may detain wind, light,
sea’s seriousness, a sprint of brook,
the din of a cataract or pile of desert sand.
Pick all the indefinable chapters
of her restless epic and bring them.
Bring jasmines, roses, Hibiscuses,
or the scents of nameless affections.
Pricking a delicate heart with a sharp thorn,
parading with a nonsensical iron heart,
driving vengefully a train with no fuel,
angling flowers of water
are the arts you know, I know.
Pluck and bring her beliefs, your disbelief
in baskets of suspicion, bags of insult.
She brings a fistful of ash, stores in casket,
becomes unseen vermillion on the forehead.
Think of your birth deeply, not of her death;
she is a beautiful rainbow
born to the dream of this land.
Becoming a painting brush in a safe casket,
she spreads hues on the screen of your life.
With the splendor of dawn, the bangle sounds
drive broom in the front yard.
Dejection of dark nights plundered from
the treasury of smiles enter the kallapi water.
She makes her heart an alukupidacha,
and wipes the whole house with it.
Unlike spots on the threshold,
eating or praying are not constant for her.
She becomes a boon in the form of
tasty curries, pickles for big bellies!
Assumes the face of a round roti,
and sticks to the dining plate.
Cleans vessels to ascend
the tower of knowledge.
Becomes washed clothes
for your stinking nonstop sweat.
If the kitchen or other room raises no flames
in times of self-control’s pitilessness,
these crowns of Hibiscuses blossom
blissfully with unique red flowers.
(After reading about the enhanced home violence during the Corona pandemic Published in NamastheTelangana paper and Maduravani-Magazine Recited this poem in VeekshnamKavisammelan in the USA)
*****
(To be continued-)
ఎం .ఏ. తెలుగు , తెలుగు పండిత శిక్షణ (20 ఏళ్ళ బోధనానుభవం), ఉస్మానియా విశ్వ విద్యాలయం లో ‘ ఒద్దిరాజు సోదరుల జీవితం-సాహిత్యం‘ పై పరిశోధన చేసి , డాక్టరేట్ పట్టా పొందాను . నిత్యవిద్యార్థిగా నిరంతర సాహిత్య పఠనం . పెద్దల మాటలను , కొత్తగొంతుకలను వినడం ఇష్టం .