topics: |  poetry | oriya

Sitakant Mahapatra is a noted Oriya poet and IAS officer. Has won a
number of awards, including Jnanpith 1993.

Contents

Dhangda's Love Song                               7
The Bridge on the Mahanadi                        9
Shadow                                            11
The Rock                                          14
You Could Come Some Other Time Death              16
An Evening in Summer                              18
Words                                             20
The Song of Jara The Hunter                       22
Landscape                                         51
Sick Bed                                          54
Childhood                                         58
Kurukshetra                                       65
The Empire                                        68
The Ignorant Men                                  72
The Saint                                         75
Cleo                                              79
Time Does Noi Fly                                 26
The Ruined Temple                                 28
The Wind                                          30
The Aerodrome                                     33
Swan                                              35
My Chamber                                        38
The House                                         42
The Garden                                        48
Rain                                              84
The Still Wave                                    87
The Sky of Words                                  90
The Jester                                        94
The Dark Ferryman                                 97
Yashoda's Soliloquy                              100

Excerpts

Dhangda's Love Song

On the hill's sloping ground
I asked you to give me love, dreams,
A touch, tobacco leaves.
And you said : Here there are only
the harvesting men.
Not here.

In the twilight dark,
at the place where the village
now begins to be restless
with the scent of mahula,
I asked for your affection, your body;
Or else, just give your word, I said.
And you said : I'm always afraid of
the fireflies and the lovely stars;
it is better that we leave this solitary place.

Inside the forest, when
the beating of the heart could be heard,
I asked for your love, your touch.
And you said : Oh, no! here there is just
the pale grey earth. Wouldn't this
flower-like body, this pure
unblemished soul, turn earth-pale?
Not here, not here!
Beside the rivulet, there was no one,
just the lone bird that sang.
I asked for your touch, for darkness.
And you said : On the rivulet's clear mirror
everything is seen.
Not here, not here.

The whole world had dropped off to sleep,
even the moon and the stars,
I asked for your touch, asked for life,
and for my helpless, shivering soul, begged for
a small place in the nest of your body.
And you said : Even in the dark, inside
your eye's mirror, everything is clearly seen.
Not now, not now.

Plucking out my eyes, I give them
to you, like a lotus-gift . Take them.
And now give me the touch, the love, the dark,
give my lonely soul its much needed shelter.

Links

foundation SAARC writers