It SCORE ASSAMESE POEMS

THREE it SCORE ASSAMESE POEMS

Compiled and Translated D N Bezboruah

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Three Score Assamese Poems

Compiled and translatedby D. N. BEZBORUAH

...1. oH Iluw'

..oM .Da/^

NATIONAL BOOK TRUST. INDIA

Bhaben Barua She Pursued me Even in my Sleep Memory of a Shipwreck Only the Sound of Stillness Words Suddenly Lost The Weight of Lead Where have they Gone? Hands in the Darkness Two Poems Harekrishna Deka Nirmalprabha Bordoloi Dawning Winds Posterity Ashes Moonlight Poignant The Soldier's Death Unvanquished Bireswar Barua Existence Lily's Afternoon Songs of Darkness Diary Early Dawn Hours Tarun Barua The One Who is to Arrive A Stream of the Ganga Flowed Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya A Moment of Courage A Palace in Bukhara Anis-uz-Zaman Samarkhand Limits Keshab Mahanta Time My Fate Fragrance Hem Barua Niren Barua A Discovery My Existence Homen Borgohain Memory Note on the poets Dilip Barua Procession of Death Hari Barkakati After the Immersion of the Goddess On the Death of a O^nfidante On the Death of a Leader Question Hirendra Nath Dutta The Berlin Wall

Three Score Assamese Poems / vii

vi / Three Score Assamese Poems

Bhaben Barua She Pursued me Even in my Sleep Memory of a Shipwreck Only the Sound of Stillness Words Suddenly Lost The Weight of Lead Where have they Gone? Hands in the Darkness Two Poems Harekrishna Deka Nirmalprabha Bordoloi Dawning Winds Posterity Ashes Moonlight Poignant The Soldier's Death Unvanquished Bireswar Barua Existence Lily's Afternoon Songs of Darkness Diaiy Early Dawn Hours Tarun Barua The One Who is to Arrive A Stream of the Ganga Flowed Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya A Moment of Courage A Palace in Bukhara Anis-uz-Zaman Samarkhand Limits Keshab Mahanta Time My Fate Fragrance Hem Barua Niren Barua A Discovery My Existence Homen Borgohain Memory Note on thepoets Dilip Barua Procession of Death Hari Barkakati After the Immersion of the Goddess On the Death of a Confidante On the Death of a Leader Question Hirendra Nath Dutta The Berlin Wall

Three Score Assamese Poems / vii

vi / Three Score Assamese Poems Preface

This is a slim anthology of my English translations of Assamese poetry written in the secondhalf of the twentieth century. 1 do not presume to make any claims that the anthologyis a representativecollection of Assamese poetry written in those fifty yeai's. In fact, considering the size of the anthology, it is inevitable that some poets have got left out. It is a collection of Assamese poetrythatI likedandpoetry that could be translated without very much being lost in the process of translation. I have also attempted to make it an anthologyof what I regard as good Assamese poetry of the period. The focus is thus more on poetry than on the poets. The anthologybegins with poemsof Navakanta Barua because hegave his contemporaries aswell asyounger poets a new language and a newidiom. He hasthus leftus agreat legacyof not only an enriched Assamese language but also of many excellent poets. I have dispensedwath a long prefacebecauseI feelthat readers should be left alone to read and enjoypoetryon their own insteadofbeingtoldin advanceabouttrends,influences and so on that may have worked on the poets. I have translated all the poems except one ("The Silf by Navakanta Barua). As a translator, my major concern has been whether I have succeeded in rendering all these beautiful poems competently enough in another language and vwth total fidelity to the original poems.

Tliree Score Assamese Poems / ix I owe a debt of gratitude to the National Book Trust. India, for having agreed to publish this small anthology of translated Assamese poetry inan age when readers ofpoetry have dwindled in number and publishers of poetry have become evenmore scarce, I am also indebted to Shri Pradip Acharya and Shri Pankaj Thakur for a lot ofhelp.

D. N. BEZBORUAH

X/ ThreeScore Assamese Poems Navakanta Barua (1926-2002)

The Silt

Tlie palaash fires have now burnt out. The recent invasion of the saal and sotiymi woods By the April storms is past. Wlio keeps count of the dreams shed? The banks of the Kalang, Kopili and Dijoo Ai"e strewn with ancestral bones! The wild lilygrows through Where laysilent mygrandmother's heart.

What did the cloud say? - Give, O Give, Till thou art empty. Plant some roadside trees; Why, start a high school. Heave a sigh or two - the beloved traveller Is ever on the way. Let sweeping waters wash away the shells ofdead spiders.

Let our silts make fertile the two banks of Kalang. In the furrows of our grandchild's fresh farm

Three Score Assamese Poems /1 We shall awake. In our fossils will they find Weshall think of the stitching lateron. The amazing tale of one who remembers Only think. Tlie ti-ansmigrating past. Someone after us will measure anew In the gutters that wash the dream-blind lane Saying thatour measurements were all wrong. We live in. Fresh measurements theywill take. Is their future. Wlien will someone stitch the garment tofit Man? (Translatedby the poet himself.)

The Eternal Pulse Measurements How old is the night, Alakananda, It is evening now. How old is the night? Let's go to the tailor's toget measured. Pale gas lamps give no hmt, Measurement of neck chest hands and arms The hands of the clock Measurement of the thumb. Are still. We shall give measurement of the palm and the heart, Tlie entrails, the spleen and the liver, How late is it? Give count of hormones and love. Could it bemidnight? Let us give measurements of life Are you asleep, Alakananda. Of this and that and various things. Nestled in the crook ofyour arm? Onlygive the measurements. The fragrance of darkness We shall think of the stitching later on. Soars like incense For the time being let's just give measurements. And is stilled We can only give measurements; In the curves ofyour flesh. We can only take reckonings. We shall record that suicides have The night wind is mute, Swelled considerably. The bare sky clothed in dreams. We shall give count of the letters in aspeech Darkness shines with the stars Give count of the Christians in Arabia. On Maniktala's ditch. Just give measurements.

2 / Three Score Assamese Poems Tliree Score Assamese Poems / 3 We shall awake. In our fossils will they find Weshall think of the stitching lateron. The amazing tale of one who remembers Only think. Tlie ti-ansmigrating past. Someone after us will measure anew In the gutters that wash the dream-blind lane Saying thatour measurements were all wrong. We live in. Fresh measurements theywill take. Is their future. Wlien will someone stitch the garment tofit Man? (Translatedby the poet himself.)

2 / Three Score Assamese Poems Tliree Score Assamese Poems / 3 Alakananda. song of my evening. Tlie night shimmers You are perhaps asleep. And the heart quivers The countless glittering petals On Maniktala's ditch. Of the flower that is the slgr Remind me of the Upanishads... The moon-kissed breeze, The waves, the stars and dreams sing A lullaby for death. Judas The dew of sleep quivers On your eyelids. Night shines replete Murder my death with the weapon ofyour kisses. With dreams Why do this to life On Maniktala's ditch. That has its frontiers on the present? Wliat is the earthlyuse. Iaskyou. What dreams are yours Ofstretching and abridging Alakananda? A few animate moments called life. Their fitftil cadences With the elasticity ofbread and love-making. Spiral in the town's wakeful moonlight. Wine and fame? It's awake, yes, Thenight isawake and so am I. In your kisses I have not felt a dearth of love; The sky and the moon What inexorable orbiting Keep watch, Draws in your love into you Restless as Kunti's despair. Enfolding all planets, stars? Thefated house of wax. What concentrated emptiness Is it already in flames? Where the whirlpool endsl

The sleepless candle What's the harm if the flames quivering around you Be of hell? Pulses with life. Eleven more pages of Das Kapital Beyond the bounds of space and time All flames are multidirectional. And I am done. Alakananda. are you still asleep?

Three Score Assamese Poems / 5 4 / Three Score Assamese Poems Alakananda. song of my evening. Tlie night shimmers You are perhaps asleep. And the heart quivers The countless glittering petals On Maniktala's ditch. Of the flower that is the slgr Remind me of the Upanishads... The moon-kissed breeze, The waves, the stars and dreams sing A lullaby for death. Judas The dew of sleep quivers On your eyelids. Night shines replete Murder my death with the weapon ofyour kisses. With dreams Why do this to life On Maniktala's ditch. That has its frontiers on the present? Wliat is the earthlyuse. Iaskyou. What dreams are yours Ofstretching and abridging Alakananda? A few animate moments called life. Their fitftil cadences With the elasticity ofbread and love-making. Spiral in the town's wakeful moonlight. Wine and fame? It's awake, yes, Thenight isawake and so am I. In your kisses I have not felt a dearth of love; The sky and the moon What inexorable orbiting Keep watch, Draws in your love into you Restless as Kunti's despair. Enfolding all planets, stars? Thefated house of wax. What concentrated emptiness Is it already in flames? Where the whirlpool endsl

Three Score Assamese Poems / 5 4 / Three Score Assamese Poems Even last night I doled out the bread my body. Then evening. Even last night I poured out the wine my blood. With the bats' hesitant flight With the weapon of your kisses let my death be murdered; The perverse trees stand again On the farmyard of blood let there gi-ow as sacred crops On the earth as is their wont; Thirty pieces of silver. Women lean on crimsoned portals Longing anew for the drowsy hour. And we boys Inch back our fragile kites With our reels timidlyturning. Consternation, like a winged missile Bats Hits them between the eyes. The sky? The inert bats were suspended Whence did it rise above our heads? Behind the string ofgrocery shops. They kept singing: Innocuously blending Hang on! Cling on! With the flaming abundance of yellow cassia — Hold fast with both feet Amultitude of embryonic infants To the liquiddeath that speeds In the cavernous bmards of the sky. Through tense electric wires.

They saW: And then? The earth strung above the sky. Then the sl^ willagainlie And the trees that rest on the firmament Recumbent. The hillsv^dll pin it down Thrusting their roots Into the hoary darkness of the earth Astride in an inverted coital variant; Women, their mats pulled over their resilient forms, And under the monstrous breasts Ch^mg the weary hours of nocturnal ennui. Of an insatiable witch, With a brief midday siesta. Love will die a shattering death. And they saw us boys Hanging upside down from our kite-strings Like dubious notes of interrogation....

Three Score AssamesePoems / 7 6/Three Score Assamese Poems Even last night I doled out the bread my body. Then evening. Even last night I poured out the wine my blood. With the bats' hesitant flight With the weapon of your kisses let my death be murdered; The perverse trees stand again On the farmyard of blood let there gi-ow as sacred crops On the earth as is their wont; Thirty pieces of silver. Women lean on crimsoned portals Longing anew for the drowsy hour. And we boys Inch back our fragile kites With our reels timidlyturning. Consternation, like a winged missile Bats Hits them between the eyes. The sky? The inert bats were suspended Whence did it rise above our heads? Behind the string ofgrocery shops. They kept singing: Innocuously blending Hang on! Cling on! With the flaming abundance of yellow cassia — Hold fast with both feet Amultitude of embryonic infants To the liquiddeath that speeds In the cavernous bmards of the sky. Through tense electric wires.

Three Score AssamesePoems / 7 6/Three Score Assamese Poems Self-invited

Not perhaps my friend. I kiiow there really is One stolid jolt of inertia. A small islet of peace - where awaits Your beloved saving up spring in her being. In this way To give you a taste of that nectar In this way we descend. Wliich our breath has not poisoned. Above us the veranda of an ailing heaven, . Below, the pavement of a tattered livelihood; I know there is, my friend. In between, the dread of uncertainty; In the river that mind and brain have muddied, A formless if= In some part of it, yes, Wliat if wegetstuck? Is the isletof your love's soul. Where your sweetheart's calves In this way Mingle with mustard blossoms and In this waywe descend. The warmth ofthe tepid sun. In this way we descend Where tears with the faint smell of burning From weariness to exhaustion Show the way to the frustrated clowns From wakefulness to insomnia In the circus of civilization. From forgetting to loss ofmemoiy.

If you can stand it, Just in this way I could take a day's leave Tlirough the hissing of a mechanical serpent From my hell We descend. To be your guest for a while - A descent where there is no movement At least an afternoon - , And where motion begins in the stopping. ta April afternoon that the dove has stilled. In tliis way, in this way. I shall weep ifi can. And on returning.,.' on returning. Above us the veranda of an ailing heaven. Below, the crumbling pavement of a livelihood; Alas, that I shall return! In between, a huge formless if. In this way In this waywe descend.

Tliree ScoreAssamese Poems / 9 8/Three Score Assamese Poems Self-invited

Tliree ScoreAssamese Poems / 9 8/Three Score Assamese Poems

Beat the drum, the drum of myheart Nothing avails even when you conquer Lanka* Beat the drum, beat the drum. Yes, beat the drum.

Ajit Barua (b. 1928)

Some Bronze Fems AjacarandaTr^e Aniid thick ferns high as bamboo tops In the darkness ofthe smaU hours And the darkness, is our home. Tliere The lantern lights her face I lost my way Like ember. And sat down. Above me was After forty years, darkness has lightened Adark tree, a black tree The bronze ferns... Where are they? Asilken umbrella-like tree. The wax dolls shed quicksilver tears. When theday broke. I saw Ajacaranda tree O gentle reader Like a veil What have I written?. Swaying in the wind. What I used to see A horse — You cannot perceivej Adecked horse with lowered head - What Isee today TOite hke cotton wool, like foam, Kke wood ^Cannot show you. Come, let us once again Make our mistakes with skill.

Sri Lanka, rhymes with danka. an Assamese word for a large drum.

10 /Three Score Assamese Poems Three ScoreAssamese Poems /11 APair of Copper Arghas Last year on such a mornmg I had wakened - wakened with fresh yawns. On a moment's hazy bridge Whenever I wake with the dawn, Where time comes to a half? Something scrapes my mind Very gently, lest it hurt — One day a mangydog, meat in its mouth. What if today the impossible happened? Held me clutched by my chest What iftoday Iwere to see again Like the dx-ead ofgoing toschool The first-love of myprevious birth Without that map of Kamrup. Suddenly taking off her glasses. Ajid. to put it briefly. Sparkling eyes suddenly lifeless, That silent evening Eyes the colour of abrown bird's wing? Standing alone in the middle of the field (Do not fear, she cannot weep) With fields, fields all around And the clutch at my heart. But these days. While from the distant village Now and again Isuspect The Wafting smoke hummed. That she was capable of tears (fourpoems timishited by D. N. Bezboruahandthe poet) Aiid on that day Was only defiant In restraint - like diamond.

Wearing a Silk Robe Again Today

Wearing a silk robe again today J^d-misting Time 1baskin the sun The ceremonial turban on my head Asmoky October morning. (To hide the streaks of grey). The molten mist floats The best is what Ididn't get? ^thoughIhad lived thissomemorningpast life (Just aone-year-old) Waking before dawn I smelt blossoms, Jasmine oil, nose rings and sweat All over again. Because... the cook shed ofthe spring festival.

Tliree Score Assamese Poems / IS 12/Thi-ee Score Assam.lese Poems APair of Copper Arghas Last year on such a mornmg I had wakened - wakened with fresh yawns. On a moment's hazy bridge Whenever I wake with the dawn, Where time comes to a half? Something scrapes my mind Very gently, lest it hurt — One day a mangydog, meat in its mouth. What if today the impossible happened? Held me clutched by my chest What iftoday Iwere to see again Like the dx-ead ofgoing toschool The first-love of myprevious birth Without that map of Kamrup. Suddenly taking off her glasses. Ajid. to put it briefly. Sparkling eyes suddenly lifeless, That silent evening Eyes the colour of abrown bird's wing? Standing alone in the middle of the field (Do not fear, she cannot weep) With fields, fields all around And the clutch at my heart. But these days. While from the distant village Now and again Isuspect The Wafting smoke hummed. That she was capable of tears (fourpoems timishited by D. N. Bezboruahandthe poet) Aiid on that day Was only defiant In restraint - like diamond.

Wearing a Silk Robe Again Today

Tliree Score Assamese Poems / IS 12/Thi-ee Score Assam.lese Poems Long, long paths over sun-baked sods, Paths that perplex amid endless fields; Long paths, paved roads, meandering tracks

The path I didn't take must be the best. Hiren Bhattachaiyya (b. 1932)

Hiese my Words (for the younger poet)

In these, the words that have caressed The orchards ofmy dreams. Is the grace ofa Hfe-style. The intimate warmth of time. I have no inventions ofmy own. Like a farmer, Iroll words on my tongue To seehow each one tastes. Ihold them in my palm To see how warm they are. I know-words are the lusty offspring Of man's noble creation; I am a mere poet in these words that I have relayed From other shoulders. Is man's cruel experience •^d the mauling of history.

Tliree Score Assamese Poems /15 Long, long paths over sun-baked sods, Paths that perplex amid endless fields; Long paths, paved roads, meandering tracks

The path I didn't take must be the best. Hiren Bhattachaiyya (b. 1932)

Hiese my Words (for the younger poet)

Tliree Score Assamese Poems /15 For Poetry, a Single Prayer Between mywishes and my waiting, A breezy winter. The poet's voice rebounds against mercilessness An uncontested echo. At the tip of his pen quiver After all. death is also a crafting. The promised poems, his entity. An unappetizing sculpture chiselled out oflife's granite. Threatened by a tenseness ofnerves, In the famished poet's feeble voice Is the hymn of grief, the freedom of art I broke the earthen flower vase Let me finish this poem like me- Knowing that flowers blossom The message of blood dies sti-uiling In the complacence of my wayward mind. In the squalor of its denuded body, Holdmg aquaint banner of the future ^otect my right to hammer to fragments The aloofness of familiar words Fartakmg That slaughters afutileunvanquishedreality sword About to die of anaemia. ^ou know veiy well Tliis poet has nothing else - Justa loneshirt that too parting at the seams.

Four Poems Love must be just like this. Baring covers to soothe the heart.

""voiced prophesy Of

'6/Three Score As; Tliree Score Assamese Poems /17 samese Poems For Poetry, a Single Prayer Between mywishes and my waiting, A breezy winter. The poet's voice rebounds against mercilessness An uncontested echo. At the tip of his pen quiver After all. death is also a crafting. The promised poems, his entity. An unappetizing sculpture chiselled out oflife's granite. Threatened by a tenseness ofnerves, In the famished poet's feeble voice Is the hymn of grief, the freedom of art I broke the earthen flower vase Let me finish this poem like me- Knowing that flowers blossom The message of blood dies sti-uiling In the complacence of my wayward mind. In the squalor of its denuded body, Holdmg aquaint banner of the future ^otect my right to hammer to fragments The aloofness of familiar words Fartakmg That slaughters afutileunvanquishedreality sword About to die of anaemia. ^ou know veiy well Tliis poet has nothing else - Justa loneshirt that too parting at the seams.

Four Poems Love must be just like this. Baring covers to soothe the heart.

""voiced prophesy Of

'6/Three Score As; Tliree Score Assamese Poems /17 samese Poems Postscript

Every day is a death for me; Longevity isonlyin the lineof mypalm. This is how I get on. When I hear the footsteps Nilmoni Fhukan Of lV\e dream fairy. I reflect. (b. 1933) Life is more beautiful Than it can be. Was it a Friday or a Sunday

Was it a Friday ora Sunday? The gust of wind Sound of the Flute Snatched the ripe orange Prom my mouth. As Ifudged through the darkness. I suddenly heard In my bosom I felt The clarion call of light. Ariver dashed against my heart And stilled in redness. In my bones, preserved to make Adevastating weapon. the tips ofleaves quivered Isensed the sound of aflute. ^6 remorse of aburnt evening. Was it a Friday or aSunday? ^ the mirrors floated Ine cry offallen stars. Some dried leaves of lime. Too could have cleared those leayes7 Whose were those soothing handsT

181 Three Score Assamese Poems Three Score Assamese Poems /19 Postscript

181 Three Score Assamese Poems Three Score Assamese Poems /19

She Pursued me Even in my Sleep Tlie sheep scampered; And with the burning oftheir hairy darkness were scattered She pursued me even in my sleep. Numberless bits of cough Where could she be now? And falling on thebranches ofa denuded tree Does her face still bear Tliey remained stickhig to tlie dry blades of gi'ass That uprooted tree? Until the sun broke out. Do the two reddened rivers The sheep scampered Still bathe her lips? To another field Beneath the dust they had scattered. Do her eyes still bear Tliose two black steeds? Some roimd words Even today evety night Vaporized and flew away — They pause treading my heart. ^ords flitting to and fro across the telegraph wires. Some round words the stillness of a chunk of wax the stillness of the skeleton ^ some nameless old woman Only the Sound of Stillness ver the longevity of time "'y the sound ofstillness.

At last from aniche in the rock

AOverdry tnecough earthwafted in the wind Suddenly Lost ipiwtered and dropped down ^uddenly lost the of aflock of gracing sheep. y ^^^izzle of the fading day niy Uttle bird.

20/Three Score As. 'Samese Poems Hiree Score Assamese Poems / Zl

Was that what you spoke of On that midnight As you shed silent tears? What were we talking about just now? Aboutstone being hard, water cold. Tliree About fire burning And peacocks spreading theirs plumes In all these days About what theworld's first dawn waslike I couldn't find a life And why a sweet fruit becomes bitter Tliat Icould call my ovm The moment it is in the mouth. Or a death that was all for myself.

About the sky flaring up Who is it that nibbles to shreds Like a live ember days and nights? Just at five minutes to midnight. How do I tide over this gory time? tad fte shadow of bamboo clumps Tummg to ashes. Who is that having some celebration So early in the evening? who among the dead Will attend it?

That you love me? many times did ^dcalfhowskinmanymoo?times did they return Reddened with blood? lovetomankindthat is dedicated did theysee on their return ^"^lytcdestitatechUdt.n hen they looked back? Or to What lies hidden dwho did they see the thirsty weeds ^ that lonely labyrinthine path? tthe bottom of the sea achunk of coal

^'^'HireeScoK^, Three Score Assamese Poems / •samese Poems Five

Like the wind The horses are jumping about in the courtyard. Just Usten to their neighing, Nirmalprabha Bordoloi Last night, a poet like you (1933-2004) With a low voice Passed away -

One who had reaHzed Dawning That there was nothing in his poehy Any more profound Does the day break Than the chirping of the cricket. With the sound of guns? Not at all. Six It breaks with the cry Ofthat bird Have you fallen asleep? nibbles through Are you all that sleepy? night's darkiiess Wakeup. slowly. What were we talking about Just a moment ago About water being cold, stone hard And peacocks spreading their plume? Ashes l^ven't you heard its crackling? •"e sandalwood fire? 'ft the drape from my bosom look, ^ 'handful of ashes.

poeiiis / 27 26 /Three Score Assamese Poems Three ScoreAssamese Poignant Existence saw him leaving Iput myself ina cage long the paddy fields And latch myself in \Tien the sun sloped dov^ai, With bits of reasoning. . v^cker sunshade on his head, )n his shoulders Iput myself on scales 'he steady creak And try to weigh myself 3f two groaning baskets. With an assortment of values. behind him departed All reasoning is unavailing, rhe golden autunm sun All values helpless. The "thatched hamlet me unpaved road along the shrubs % existence And the singing birds. tackles in laughter. He was leaving and departed. Who knows if he will return ^flow through In this lifetimei orifices of all prohibitions keep changing forms. Sometimes a flower Sometimes a sword sometimes... sometimes...- Unvanquished Ishall die tomorrow ^ remain alive today Songs of Darkness

cocked, have Waited g^*^ousand years the staircase of darkness. poems 129 ThreeScore Assamese 28/ThreeScore Assam,ese Poems Poignant Existence saw him leaving Iput myself ina cage long the paddy fields And latch myself in \Tien the sun sloped dov^ai, With bits of reasoning. . v^cker sunshade on his head, )n his shoulders Iput myself on scales 'he steady creak And try to weigh myself 3f two groaning baskets. With an assortment of values. behind him departed All reasoning is unavailing, rhe golden autunm sun All values helpless. The "thatched hamlet me unpaved road along the shrubs % existence And the singing birds. tackles in laughter. He was leaving and departed. Who knows if he will return ^flow through In this lifetimei orifices of all prohibitions keep changing forms. Sometimes a flower Sometimes a sword sometimes... sometimes...- Unvanquished Ishall die tomorrow ^ remain alive today Songs of Darkness

cocked, have Waited g^*ôusand years the staircase of darkness. poems 129 ThreeScore Assamese 28/ThreeScore Assam,ese Poems Everything seems so pointless. Rarely do Iget to meet him. The daily sight of the sun. Wlien like a pearl My body's nocturnal song, Bursting forth from its shell The mutual exchange of greetings. He sometimes stands facing me. He dwarfs the huge person I wait with my ears cocked. Within me. Darkness walks up and down Tlirough my eyes, Through my heart Waiting in darkness with my eyes. Waiting in darkness with my heart In darkness, Tlie One Who is to Arrive Darkness. ofhis coming " the razor sharpness of your gaze, ^-^ws of his coming blood, Early Dawn Hours Q,""^ Stretching and clenching youi' Withdrawn hands. Imeet him ever so rarely Whenever Ido, ^ Wants to come back time and again, his hands in mine 1'helpless mien.brow Wth bowed head Iw.sh him. inumphant, victorious," ' îigry inarticulate curses. him ever so rarely, Ijg at the sight of breeze becomes green At,h^"^Sdown; ™«ever he opens,®::;, D^,7^^Shtof S. moon suffuses the skies. Thaf eyes , Mfii prisoners of transient infatuatio j ^ îght ofhands

Three Score Assamese Poems Tliree Score Assamese Poe^s / Everything seems so pointless. Rarely do Iget to meet him. The daily sight of the sun. Wlien like a pearl My body's nocturnal song, Bursting forth from its shell The mutual exchange of greetings. He sometimes stands facing me. He dwarfs the huge person I wait with my ears cocked. Within me. Darkness walks up and down Tlirough my eyes, Through my heart Waiting in darkness with my eyes. Waiting in darkness with my heart In darkness, Tlie One Who is to Arrive Darkness. ofhis coming " the razor sharpness of your gaze, ^-^ws of his coming blood, Early Dawn Hours Q,""^ Stretching and clenching youi' Withdrawn hands. Imeet him ever so rarely Whenever Ido, ^ Wants to come back time and again, his hands in mine 1'helpless mien.brow Wth bowed head Iw.sh him. inumphant, victorious," ' ^iigry inarticulate curses. him ever so rarely, Ijg at the sight of breeze becomes green At,h^"^Sdown; ™«ever he opens,®::;, D^,7^^Shtof S. moon suffuses the skies. Thaf eyes , Mfii prisoners of transient infatuatio j ^ ^ight ofhands

Three Score Assamese Poems Tliree Score Assamese Poe^s / That should be outstretched Retracted and engaged in onanism. He would have come long ago.

Birendra Kumar Bhattachaiyya (1924-1997)

AFalaceinBxikhara

emii- there is dead. now paint pictures undaunted; ^ the walls, artist's creation is alive. ^ ®sky now spreads the peacock's fan, fascinating bright stars...-

Samarkhand

entered a peaceful grove; 0 :;^'aush;7 •J-,Only open-hearted embraces. The ^heard moaning 'n be "^eath the tombs. Poems 133 Tliree Score Assamese 32/Three Score Assamese Poems Keshab Mahanta Hem Barua (1926-2005) (1915-1977)

My Fate A Discovery

In your hand is my brow; And the sweat of my brow On the earth beneath your feel. On p the hues of the rainbow On my brow was your liand of sleep In some torrential flood of tears The in my ears; The earth wore deep. M^ floating at midnight '^"ovide The earth beneath your feet Like On ^^ckground music. Crumbled in landslides. And str^ death My gallows, trident on my forehead '^^fyino benumbed.

o ®strian ' and on awoke.

34/Three Score Assamese Poems Three Score Assamese Poems I35 Keshab Mahanta Hem Barua (1926-2005) (1915-1977)

My Fate A Discovery

o ®strian ' and on awoke.

34/Three Score Assamese Poems Three Score Assamese Poems I35