Pencil
(I)
Sitting on a bench
A girl in blue jeans
Pares a pencil
And a rose sprouts.
The pencil writes
Black words
On a white paper
As if black butterflies.
The pencil writes
Words white
On the canvass of heaven
As if the moon and the stars!
The pencil carves
Golden wings
On the lap of the universe
As if the dreams of a girl!
(II)
Near the leg of a table,
A paralyzed hand asked
To a broken blue pencil:
“Can you write?”
Hesitant, the pencil answered:
“Yes. I can write”
And I can paint
Even your portrait!
If only
You could pare with a blade
The plaster from my soft skin!”
Amazed! I
Kept listening to the Zee TV
The voice of Hussein Bakhsh:
“Rahne Do Abhi Sagar-O-Mina…!”
“Let the goblet of wine near me…!”
(III)
My lovely little daughter
Lights a pencil
With a sharpener!
In the space of white paper
Light begins to scatter.
A black sparrow takes flight with a tree
A fountain springs off the peacock’s
eyes
In the air Agni on his chariot flies
An aeroplane taxis on a road
A tiger talks to a cow.
On the top of a black tree
Rises the one-eyed sun
And above it a piece of cloud
And on the cloud’s forehead
A bluefish flying.
In the waves of a stream
A golden butterfly swimming!
My dear daughter
In her merriments
Draws many pictures!
But when the school teacher
Gives homework to her
My doll often casually in anger
Breaks the nib.
The flame of pencil extinguishes
And the horizon of white paper
Is left with only spirals of smoke!
Jayant Parmer © translation Ashaq
Hussain Parray
