Original work: Smt Banaja Devi
Translator: Uday Kanungo [Guest contributor]
KAJALAPATI
Your black-beautied body grips the champa boughs
And sometimes, perched alone, you gaze, so entranced and spellbound;
You sit hidden amid a tangle of leaves, akin to a flower
Which the sky, extending a curling fist, seeks as if to pluck.
Original post: Smt. Banaja Debi
Translator: Uday Kanungo [Guest contributor]
[Translated from Odiya]
There wasn’t a single tree in sight nearby. There wasn’t in view a patch of green earth, not the faintest bit of greenery. Anywhere you laid your eyes, there were only dense bundles of houses made of cement and brick, before you and behind, to your left and right. Houses on both sides of the road, houses closely stacked one by one and lined up, mostly amongst them actually being shop-cabins. And hence, forever populated, with the noise of daily business and an atmosphere of cacophony. The sufficient width of the road was rendered useless, what with the bustling crowd and many vehicles coming and going leaving only the narrowest of spaces left. Why, of all places, did his son rent a house amidst such a swarming bazaar, was beyond Navghan.
onubaad 