Search This Blog

Wednesday, October 3, 2012



The Truth

(Translation of the poem ‘neru’ by Vijayalakshmi)

When my tongue too crawls
Within the door-less incarnations of silence,
When every tight held holding
Spills like water from hands,
When tear-fed desires
Abjectly reveal their frivolity,
When carcasses of gifts are being dumped
In bins after races,
When my sun freezes
Leaving his chores of rising and setting, beyond,
While the paleness of camphor screams
After all the particles wane in sublimation;
Does the truth of the nameless void
Claim itself to be the OLD AGE?

-translated by Reema



Vijayalakshmi said:

I find  it more sublime than the original ! My regards to the young genius.
If she cares,  she can turn out to be a  super poet.

A personal advice too - 
This can be passed on to her if  you approve.
It is this :

This type of translation works should be taken just as exercises to test our own ability to get attuned to the medium.  Her creativity should be invested in improving her skills -  otherwise she may get diverted to translation mania and her own poetry will suffer.  Many writers do both - with equal skill - if she can balance the talent, it is the best - But there is a possibility, when translated work turns out excellent, we just fall in love with our own translation, and  forget poems waiting for us in spiritus mundi !

I have seen this happen sometimes. People fall a victim to the charm of translations done by them .Like Narcissus.

This is my observation. For academic world, it may be different.  May be you people handle everything with professional skill.   Anyway, good job by Reema, Congrats !

(പരീക്ഷയ്ക്ക്  ഇപ്പോ റാങ്ക് സമ്പ്രദായം തന്നെയാണോ എങ്കി റീമ ഫസ്റ്റ് റാങ്ക് നേടാ ശ്രമിക്കണം. നല്ല ബുദ്ധിയുള്ള കുട്ടിയാണെന്ന് ഭാഷയി നിന്ന് പിടികിട്ടി.  പഴയ ഒരു ഫസ്റ്റ് റാങ്ക് (മലയാളത്തിന്റെ) ന്റെ  എല്ലാ ആശംസകളും അനുഗ്രഹവും !! )