Myself
1
I am not language;
only the first alphabets of a
primitive script;
In their bid to split me into
alphabets and words
the schools stacked my head,
mind and body with multiple
phrases converting me
into a mannequin.
But I turned into a lone
suicide squad separating
myself from languages;
I moved on with sharpened passions
among the doomed establishments;
still I didn’t become a materialist
2
I am a sentence with words missing,
always yearning for meanings
When dissolved in letters, an voice
reminds me about my real self
However in my fright
I could not but destroy
meanings
3
When butterflies flew around
I too joined them as flying verses
The butterflies which were also
equally scared of meanings
were in a frantic plight
for a way out
and I too became a butterfly
4
There is now darkness of the night
The anonymous voice of the darkness
The orgasmic delights of darkness
The primitive legacy of darkness
The whispers of the dead in darkness
The varied tunes of those who never
settle down in a single body;
The nutmeg trees in the courtyard
recited some prayer
The flooding verses of moonshine
reverberating in the unknown
transparency of primitive hymns
The flower trees slept without
chanting Upanishads
I went nude in my soul
like a virgin glowing in
a hundred modes of love
5
I am a spiritual fasting not
bothered to encroach poetry
and spell its doom
The body never preserves anything;
even the mind has no such habits
I am rummaging my memory
in search of a lady bird
which never arrows down
the soul of words
I painted the chola murals in their
forehead;
I carved the insignia of the swords
on the chests of the chera soldiers
I broke mud pots of Harappa and mohan jo Daro
on their belly
6
I am grief engraved in a primitive script
My religion is that of a maggot
My love is that of the birds disturbed
By the by the chant of leaves
My legacy is not that of artists
7
I am snow flames of love
as well as love of snow flames
The primitive
plateaus of her forehead
are the skyscape of her mind
The sterile winter of the college
The antique eyes, navel pits
The scent of plantain leaves
The bhagavat geetha
glistening in the closed
eyes of my mate
the acumen of the wind
The Buddhist statue emerging
from Marxism
The face of Budha and
the voyage of the bereaved
glisten in
moonlit night
The explicit human vastness
of kathakali in eye lines
the hunter’s aim
from the horizontal
mark on the forehead
Wars that were never fought
in the annoyed nipples
yearning to turn
and not to turn in to a human soul
in the soil saturated in décor
And this is my love
7
I am the fire that set out from
Yagasaala
The fire that pierce deep into
Yearning hearts
bodies in love
and the soul of
the depressed
8
I am in deep meditation
to acquire wisdom from wind
love from light
and humanity from soil
My static meditation extends
through years
The islands of thoughts
which I preserve amidst the
convulsions for humanity
and stomach
for me meditation is an endless
ritual
trans: saj mathews
