ONE’S OWN

S.JOSEPH

Being born by a river

Can call the river one’s own.

I had born and grown on a hill top.

Climbing down the hillside

One can reach the rivulet.

There I bathed, washed my clothes and went fishing.

When I had grown up I went down

Along the banks of the rivulet

Smashing its head against rocks

Going beyond the bend

Through the bamboo plants

Sneaking under a short bridge

It reaches a larger rivulet.

I bathed there

Washed my clothes

Caught fish.

I went further along the bank of the rivulet

The rivulet merges into a river

Did not go further along the river.

For

I am only a poet of the rivulets

A small poet

My own rivulets call out.

[Translated by Benoy P.J]

BUTTERFLIES

Butterflies are painters

Who hold pictures in both hands

And fly about.

Even at an early age when

There were no paintings on earth

They carried around pictures and

Showed them to people.

Later on came cave paintings, wall paintings

And paintings on canvases

The short-lived butterflies flew around with paintings.

When they were larvae,

They had no paintings in their hands

Worms, and painted wings at once

Tying together ugliness and beauty

They turn ugliness into beauty.

Chasing behind butterflies that fly about

The childhoods of human beings

Fly about holding two pictures.

When men age, the wings fall off

And they crawl about as worms.

(Translated by Benoy.P.J)