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Kushal Dutta
Date of Publish: 2024-11-16

A Few Poems by Kushal Dutta

 

LOKTAK LAKE

 

The garb of the hills

Came off one by one by now

The rivers were unable to bear the flood of teardrops anymore

 

On the day

The two women were paraded nude on the street

The river waters boiled to turn into vapour

and rose out into the sky

 

Not being able to bear the burden of the sinning world

At the meeting point of unruly darkish cloud with

the remaining water particles turned into vapour

from the socket of the eye flying out into the sky

Once there had been a cloudburst in the sky

Following torrential rains continually for seven days-seven nights

a lake was created in the plains with the water poured down –

people call it as the Lake of lotok*

people call it as the Lake of loktok*

people call it the Loktak Lake

 

The whiff of wind of parched sighs of legends

Blew again in opposite direction that day

On the day

The two women were paraded nude along the street

In a procession of blind-deaf-dumb people

The teardrops filled river flowing down the denuded river

Dried up finally in the lake

***

Footnotes:

* Lotok : Tears

*loktok : Corrupt (Apabhra??a) form of the word Lotok

Translated from original Assamese into English by Bibekananda Choudhury

 

LOADSHEDDING IN TOWN

 

Everywhere there is

So much advertisement

So much competition

of light

Among all these it disappears suddenly

As always?

 

It disappeared just a while ago like always

Where? Why? Under whose permission or direction?

 

Just because it is a sort of practice

To disappear for an odd couple of hours

The workers- sentry-distributors of the department

Cannot distribute prasad everywhere

So?

The boys agitating against big dams

To make the people understand the necessity of power

Since the day the electricity came down to Earth

the shimmering of the stars and the smile of the moon

has gradually diminished to nought-in protest to that?

 

Nah

Nothing of those

The cause of today’s loadshedding is a different one

The oldest merchant vending the electric bulb have passed out today

In his memory

The fireflies are parading out frequently on the ground

And

The condolence of the stars

on the sky

***

Translated from original Assamese into English by Bibekananda Choudhury

 

GRADUALLY TREE POSSESS NERVE CELL

 

1.

I know something about me that others donot

 

After reading the sentence

You too have expressed your desire to learn that

As you are always inclined to learn about others

 

At the same time

Why are you disinterested to learn about yourself

There was nothing unjust

Still

That you perhaps donot know

Or

Donot bother to think

 

And

When you’d

It’d be already too late

The leaves’d turn yellow

As days’d roll from autumn into winter

Whatever lonesome few seniors’d remain

Clinging to the twigs

Waiting for call of time

To fall off

 

Gradually tree possess nerve cell

The gloomy truth of science ever unfathomable

Would manifest before you

With great speed with the heart of literature

 

You’d stop pondering about the world

Since the day you have stopped pondering about the world

Or else since the day you have started thinking about yourself again

A door of great possibility would be unlocked or get shut

 

Still

Even if you wish to

You cannot keep the door shut for ever

And even if you keep it open

The Sunlight coming in through the open door

Scorches the feathers of your dream-wings

 

2.

Gradually tree have branches

Gradually tree have leaves

Tree have bark

Tree have greenery

Have flower

Have fruit

Trunk-roots

Do inhale-exhale

 

Gradually tree possess nerve cell

Gradually tree possess nerve cell

Gradually tree possess nerve cell

 

At last

I learnt something that others don’t

 

Now to learn this new or old fact

You keep pondering throughout the day on your own

Losing sleep at night

Else stopping to ponder about others

And to discover about some new facts about oneself

Tie the knot in the yoke

 

Because

The thing that I know is –

One got to plough got to plough

Got to plough till buds bloom

The large uneven chunks of earth need to be ground to powder

Through echer-xamar-tinishi1-moving over and then pounding with dolimora2

The dry grasses, dry stumps and hay-garbage need to be burnt down

Got to delve out and uproot the Sessor3-Keheru4-Binoi5 stumps

Got to sprinkle cowdung-oilcake-hyacinth-bindweed

Than only you can sow

Summer paddy

 

Gradually shade of tree gradually sunshine of tree

Gradually sunshine of tree gradually shade of tree

Gradually forest crossing through the tree

Woods after crossing through the forests

It is still long six months

For

Winter paddy

***

Footnotes::

01. Echer-xamar-tinishi : Phase of ploughing consecutive. Echer– the first phase of ploughing of a field; xamar– the second phase of ploughing of a field and tinishi – the third phase phase of ploughing of a field.

02. dolimora : A kind of hammer used in breaking clods of earth.

03. Sëssor : A kind of water grass and it’s the edible root grown in a low-lying area; Eleocharis dulcis

04. Keheru : A kind of grass and it’s the eatable root grown in a low-lying area; Scirpus Kysoor.

05. Binoi : A kind of grass grown along with summer paddy.

Translated from original Assamese into English by Bibekananda Choudhury

 

Poem

Pre-transcendental

 

1.

In an aqueous world in an aqueous bed

I shut my eyes after lying in the posture of Savasana

 

After first loosening the right leg thumb

I released the others too one by one in the aqueous bed

 

In the aqueous bed in the aqueous world

Next I loosened the left leg thumb too

Then the ankles of both legs

Calves knees and the waist

 

As I gradually submerged

My stomach chest back spine neck chin lip cheek tongue

Nose mouth teeth eyes ears head

Everything disappeared from my body

 

Leaving myself in the aqueous bed in the aqueous world

Now I am in ethereal state discarding the body

 

2.

Look –

By flying up and floating even higher

From the highest point of the sky

I have lost myself

 

Where life and death is inseparable

Paralyzed inquisitiveness paralyzed definition

Argument-counter argument

Reply-counter reply

 

There is nothing like starting point

There is nothing like end point

There is nothing like this bank

There is nothing like that bank

Or meaningless meaning of difference and dilemma

 

Though starting with a quandary

For me the difference between question and answer

Is meaningless at this moment

 

3

I am now formless leaving my body

And at this moment it is the only truth for me

 

But even then I couldn’t come out of my ego

(That means futility of my quest of knowing thyself!)

 

Perhaps Buddha only knows the answer

The one who is always in silence

With characteristic elegance

In the light of question

 

4

After I returned from beside Buddha

I am again in my corporeal form

Leaving my formless form

 

Changing the old pair of dress

At the awakening at the end of trance

I am opening my eyes

Again putting on a fresh pair of dress …

+++

Transcendental

...

 

(The most initial phase had been two cells

That broke into four

From four to eight

From eight to...

 

And

One day after its sudden cognition

We gave it an identifying name – embryo

 

That gradually developed inside your womb

This is the first vibration of new generation

At the end of eternal awaitance)

...

+++

Post-transcendental

 

In the twilight

The pair of eyes blinked for the first time

Welcome with ululation

 

Get up

Rise

Come to senses

Pick up a new lullaby onto your lips

 

Let the path to the prayer house be blessed

The chanting of hymns for invoking the well being

Like the sacred blow of a conch

 

Look –

From the extreme height of the sky beyond sight

A flock of white pigeon is proceeding to the sky of the eye

Flapping their wings

 

It is that another longing has woken up

On the lap of your longing

***

Translated from original Assamese into English by Bibekananda Choudhury

 

(Non) Puranic-Narrative/1

FISH

 

Construction of some tales are often as per need.

Sometimes the need of creators, sometimes

at the indirect need of listener-audience-reader.

Creation of tales are also as per the force of wings of imagination.

That’s acceptable as fictional-construction. But how much is firm

the so-called firm scripture other than science? Doesn't

the mountain of questions arise there? By taking

not as supernatural if the fish is taken as natural ?

 

The fish didn't rescue all the lives

going to be doomed in the Apocalypse. Rescued only a book—

whose essence is regarded as line of stone ages after ages.

There are many rivers-oceans of blood from the birth of the book

to the time when the letters, words and sentences

became constant and finally offered in the

water with a water-burial. Why?

 

Saying up to this the professor turned solemn. Thereafter—

 

Whether the fish rescued the book from water burial

by supernatural power or thinking to be inedible not

seen before being pushed back with his tail from water to bank?

(The fish might be dolphin too whose brain is sharper than man!)

 

In the midst of the undetermined matter was

remained undetermined already the words of the book got

slowly, slowly erased from the memory of all. Only

in the memory of a fisherman near the sea words were heaped.

That day after the huge fish was caught in net

singing songs of praise to the Fish-god during it was distributed

to all in the village meeting the speech addressed by the fisherman—

the lost words like the silvery moonlight again became crystal clear

in every one's memory. Next year on the same new moon day

in the village a big ceremonial worship was offered to the Fish-god.

In the next year too, in the next century too,

in the next millennium too…

 

Sad fact— the hero fisherman not reachable by any word of history

is now not kept in anyone's memory.

 

Narrating these words being self occupied for sometime,

the corners of the eyes of Professor Satchidananda became moist—

 

Does anyone keep the records of

so many unrecognized perseverance of space and time?

History is after all part-building of that day—

Let's climb the mountain of questions!

***

Translated from original Assamese into English by Devika Dutta

KABITA

 

One day

she narrated a tale

of a Kalpavriksha

with metaphors

 

Chain or discipline

The time when nothing

could be comprehended

 

Like the removal of peel

from banana stem

while removing the veils

one after another

it was found– the tree was

no one else

but she herself

 

On another day

it was seen

the leaves of the tree

who wanted to give endless fruits

were being nibbled

by few metaphor, simile and allegory

 

Once again I saw

during the time of digging the inferno

in search of retrieval of the meaning

There are not many days left for Spring

At this same time of infinite Winter

did she too think about tender leaves

or was she busy in digging

another tale

 

The tales are as if

the temporary chaos-discipline of crossword

Before the finding of meaning of all

symbols-similes-allegories

Thereafter through another labyrinth

again another journey

 

Beyond the boundary of orchard

expanding from the bank of river

to the bottom of hill

throughout the dense forest of shrubs

picking and picking

the unknown-unseen-unheard imageries

She is a mouthful sunshine

wet in fog

 

Tolerating the scratches of

thorny grass on feet

through the fallen leaves and branches

towards tender leaves

busy is my Vrikshakalpa

in making lesson on symbols of

dew-blood

***

Translated from original Assamese into English by Debika Dutta

 

About the poet:

Kushal Dutta (1976) is an Indian poet, journalist and editor writing in the Assamese language, has eight collections of poems including his selected poems Alop Absurd (2021). He has also edited a number of literary, cultural, GK, cine magazines, souvenirs and books including ‘Ajit Barua Kabita Samagra’ (The complete poems of Ajit Barua, 2015) and ‘Sananta Tanty Kabita Samagra’ (The complete poems of Sananta Tanty, 2020). He was awarded the JUNIOR FELLOWSHIP for literature (2002–04) from the Ministry of Culture, Govt. of India; the MUNIN BARKATAKI AWARD (2003) from the Munin Barkataki Trust (Assam); the KATHAMALITA AWARD (2011) from Kathamalita Group (Assam) and the SRIJAN SAHITYA SAMMAN (2013, from ‘Srijan Xahitya Sammelan’ (West Bengal). Moreover, he has participated in several major literary events, including NEW VOICES (Bhubaneswar 2004, organized by Sahitya Akademi); the 51st AKASHVANI KAVI SAMMELAN (Ujjain 2007, by All India Radio); the 31st SAARC FESTIVAL OF LITERATURE (New Delhi 2010, by FOSWAL); the 2nd KAVYA HOTRA (Goa, 2016, by Goa Kala Academy), All India Poetry Festival (New Delhi, 2016, by Sahitya Akademi) etc. His few poems have been translated into all major Indian regional languages including English and also some major languages of the world. His poems and book chapter have been selected for MA Syllabus of Hindi and BA Syllabus of Assamese, Cotton University, MA Syllabus of Assamese, North Lakhimpur College (Autonomous, under Dibrugarh University) and BA Syllabus of Journalism and Mass Communication, Krishna Kanta Handiqui State Open University. He has also edited the textbook of Social Science (From class III to VII, along with Bibekananda Choudhury) of Sankaradeva Shishu Niketan. Some of Dutta's poems have been recited by American actor Steve Kantor and noted artist Aboni Bora. By profession Kushal is a journalist working with Dainik Asam, an Assamese daily from Guwahati.

About Translators:

Bibekananda Choudhury

Noted writer-translator Bibekananda Choudhury is a retired Engineer (Electrical) of the Irrigation Department, Govt. of Assam. He has translated extensively from Assamese into English and Bengali and also from English into Assamese. French Language Education Diploma holder (from Guwahati University) Choudhury has published several translated books both in Assamese and English.

Debika Dutta

Writer-teacher Debika Dutta is a Post Graduate Teacher in English posted at Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Rangiya, Kamrup. Originally hailing from Pathsala, she writes poems and articles both in Assamese and English.

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