Poems by Swami Antar Nirav
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Mahamai
She has forgotten her lover’s name Holding my hand Mai implores me to see her off to her youth She says Old fairies live in the mirror Don’t look into it too much the path to youth goes around the moon that’s why the eye becomes young on nights of the full moon the newborn moon is like an eyebrow right here where a lake has formed I had shed a tear the fish don’t even know they are in love the breeze that touched me and went away is now back the stone that skittered down the mountain is sleeping in the river trees don’t fight with the night neem pods are sweet to someone numbed by poison maybe even stones perceive moonlight as moonlight she’s been lengthening her hair with an ivory comb the caterpillar’s blood is green the pregnant woman has learnt to walk she’ll birth a warrior has a cobweb ever trapped a human? leave it be she can even hear a child’s footsteps who was it that went off in her bier? in the ambrosial hours she blows a conch her back turned to hell Mahamai has been searching for heaven I shower my love on spring which comes to see me only once a year when I go to bed both flame and darkness are put out the shroud covers the body like clouds she looks beautiful even in the shroud flowers in crematoriums don’t seem to be in full bloom the scent of the night jasmine wafting through graveyards frightens me why don’t my folks stitch a shroud? Mai says Place a diya behind my back I’ve been in love with my long shadow Translated from the Punjabi by Sarabjeet Garcha Lal Ded The crazy woman drank the entire lake Within seconds she filled it up again to the brim with her own milk 2 She plucked apples from the trees Rinsing them in her own milk she attached them to the trees again 3 She brought a blue flower to her breast suckled it turned it into saffron 4 Her breasts spilled out First snow be blessed! Translated from the Punjabi by Sarabjeet Garcha |
Swami Antar Nirav is a Pothohari, Punjabi and Hindi poet. He is a resident of Jammu. He has received his higher education from Annamalai University. Pothohari has a special place in Punjabi poetry. He has authored two poetry collections titled Kujh Baqi Hai in 2019, by Kirrat publications and Nahin in 2022 by Copper Coin Publications.
Sarabjeet Garcha is a poet, editor, translator and publisher. His five books of poems include All We Have, A Clock in the Far Past and Lullaby of the Ever-Returning, in addition to a volume each of poems translated from Marathi and prose from Hindi. He has translated several American poets into Hindi, including W.S. Merwin and John Haines, and several Indian poets into English, among them Mangalesh Dabral and Leeladhar Jagoori. He has received the Fellowship for Outstanding Artists from the Government of India, the International Publishing Fellowship from the British Council, and the Godyo Podyo Probondho Award. His poems have been translated into German, Spanish, Russian, Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi and Hindi. He is the founder and editorial director of Copper Coin (www.coppercoin.co.in), a multilingual publishing company based in Delhi NCR.
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