मंसिर १९, बुधबार ०८:३८ 
| | editorआश्विन १, बिहीबार १६:४४ |
Sunita Paudyal
The sky prostrate on the pitch dark of the night has shown a different aspect today
Why warring among themselves are the sooty mounds of clouds?
Why ravaged are the sprouts by the gales of disconsolate wind?
Why are sagging thus the flower beds as if burdened by unfair punishment?
Why shakes this terrain?
Why scream the birds at this hour of returning to roost?
This river flowing in mourning brings out an eerie wail
My tumultuous heart knows not what it suspects of-
Surely, something terrible is afoot!
Knifed is affection, sharpened even more with callousness
Ceaselessly, the barren walls of the heart are wrenched dry of dharma1
Clawing, breaking backbones, sour juice is rubbed into wounds
The eyes and minds yearning for equality are blindfolded with bigotry
The injuries of injustice are impressed like rainbows on bosoms and thighs
Freedom is wrapped like a beedi2 and smoked away to a distance
Today, even the sunflower droops in shame
Why laments my heart this way
As if a growing fetus is discharging in bloody chunks
Leveling the myriad injuries of the world?
Tender buds sprouting on with audacious bravery have been sacrificed
The blowing breeze has stopped all of a sudden
Consciousness has issued a profound cry of agony
The caved-in earth,
The Bagmati that remembers not to flow,
The sapling sacrificed to the fire,
All are speechless!
My wandering sights are deceived
Today, all of sudden, the moon is lost from the ever-vigilant sky
And in its stead, one by one, bright stars have been added:
Dharmabhakta
Shukraraj
Gangalal, and
Dasharath Chand3 have been
Hanged one by one.
Finally,
Stars have been added above-
The moon’s nowhere to be found.
- In Hinduism, dharma signifies the order that makes life and universe possible, and includes duties, rights, laws, conduct, virtues and “right way of living.”
- A beedi (also spelled bidi or biri) is a thin cigarette or mini-cigar filled with tobacco flake and commonly wrapped in a Tendu (Diospyros melanoxylon) or Piliostigma racemosum leaf tied with a string or adhesive at one end. It originates from the Indian subcontinent.
- Dharmabhakta Mathema, Shukraraj Shastri, Gangalal Shrestha, and Dasharath Chand are four martyrs who were executed by the autocratic Rana regime in the winter of 1941 for opposing the oppressive rule.
Translated from the Nepali original by Roshan Koirala.
यसलाई जीवित राख्नकोलागि तपाइँको
आर्थिक सहयोग महत्वपूर्ण हुन्छ ।
