Creation and Criticism

Kumar Ravindra (1940-2019) is a well-known bilingual poet and critic of modern India. He wrote more than one and a half dozen books in Hindi and one collection of poems— ‘The Sap is Still Green’ (Writers Workshop, 1988). When he was alive, he was felicitated with a dozen honors/awards including 'Sahitya Bhushan' (2005) from Uttar Pradesh Hindi Sansthan, Lucknow, U.P.

1. The Seed

Sure

when the sun-beam bloomed

I knew the seed was mine.

in the flower- dust of rays

a gloom whispered

somewhere a dark carcass burnt

a call was left on my shore

over the sand stood a night

weeping alone

but deep in the veins of dust

a birth hankered

something moved

a breath stirred

and silently a moment lived

yesterday left a shadow behind

today knows

where is the path

a shadow is not a dead ground

anybody can tread it

tomorrow when it comes –

must know whereon it walks

but sure when the sun glooms

it leaves a seed

in the rosy sand

to become the rose of the morning

my seed is never dead.

2. Ashes

Rose thoughts were

in the room

when you entered

with your sack of cabbages

glowing joy of bargain

at the vegetable mart;

pride in

saving a few (priceless) coins

stared with contempt

and climbed the stairs

going up to the kitchen;

rose thoughts

shivered and shrank

from that look

of wise cabbages

then withered into silence;

the season was

not for them,

smoke filled their doom

a death-smell pervaded

the mind

gloom of a confusion

or ashes of a dead cigar

lay in the ash-tray.

3. The City

The city is dry

the sparrows

no more sit

on the branches

for the winds

have grown murderous of late;

the equation of flowers

that some youthful eye

once gave

to the trees

when the heart was warm

and the soul emotional

has been killed

by the dry bones

of this season;

sky dozes like

a paltry subaltern

on night duty;

there are reluctant thorns

inside our fists –

their growing is a naked fact

I dare not face

though the city is dray

I know.

4. Eating

Here

Sit upon this sofa

And look towards life

Stirring your

Somnambulant tea-cups;

Nimble fingers

wearing hard-hearted rings

shape your

emergent feelings

in an arranged moment;

there is a

heartless clinking of spoons

among the pots

and callous eating of minutes,

figures move upon a

habitual dial

counting day;

touching your irrelevant thoughts

a thieving sun-ray

moves

to your guilty apartment;

outside the birds chirp

about open wings.

5. Thought

My sun-drenched thought

bloomed to a hibiscus joy

when through my garden

your cupid walked;

why, I know the meaning;

among the thorns

a softness murmured,

the tender earth laughed:

do you know what sustained me?

a memory that lived ages since -

mine a thoroughbred memory

it lives not beyond tomorrow

every tomorrow it breeds

is an extension of yesterday.

How I know it’s a nice

pastime to lead my memory

by the finger;

it is ever so young –

it needs two to mature into years-

the memory is alone

and time is a brittle thought;

touch it not with death -

for death also the time will come –

then you will need me.