Voices Within: Sarala Ram Kamal

Sarala Ram Kamal  is a bilingual (English/Malayalam) poet/translator from Trivandrum. By profession she is a freelance graphic designer and also works as a DAISY Technology Trainer for the visually challenged. She has published a book of poems called “The Unfurling: Wordflies and other poems” and translated a book of short stories into Malayalam. Her poems have appeared in many national/international anthologies like The Indo-Australian anthology, The Scaling Heights etc. 

The Masks

Like a pack of cards scattered,

rolling on the street by wind,

they are moving around, drugged,

with kids on their hips, stolen

from their real mothers. The babies

stopped crying for their moms and

dads. Their tears dried and noses

leak. Maybe they too are drugged!

They are everywhere among the crowd,

in markets, junctions, temple gates …

A man with hanging legs being carried

to the market gate, placed on dirty rugs;

Stretching his hands out the whole day

he calls all - mother, father, sister, brother …

- but in vain. They take him back when

the market is empty. Clowns indeed, all

these, forced to wear the mask the whole

day, without or hiding the thought of self,

and in nights curl in the dark corners,

obviously travelling in oblivion,

some by the roadside, keeping the head on

heaps of waste, among rats and dogs.

We don’t see anymore, anything but see

only the possibility of making space for us

to move ahead in the crowd; don’t hear

anything but only that within our heads.

We are this world and use these clowns

for a tool to make money and shout

and preach whole day the philosophy

of staying in happiness and in peace,

wearing a mask to cover the hypocrisy.

Or are we (you and I) and they, each a different

world, unknown to each other but

destined to pass by every now and then?

Rainbow

She stands suspended up at some

Nowhere place, gathering herself,

Colourless, transparent.

He slits her asunder, into

Seven colours, (calls them

Different names,) then into

Another million in bet’n them.

Ah! It is true that everything

Has to come out of something,

Even if it is from nowhere.

Or, how come he makes a rainbow

Out of her nothingness!

Taste of Blue

A moonlit night I stared at

The sky through the finger-gaps that

Stretched towards my eyes, of long

Silhouette coconut fronds;

The blue tasted misty and soft.

A sunny day I searched your

Eyes, the oceans, skies and more,

Through the cracks of your words,

(like flat, fat and dull white birds);

The blue tasted salty and cold.

The blue with orange of kingfisher, or

The blue with green of morning glory-

Tastes the sublime love of nature.

When we started to paint the sky

Brown and the ocean water black?

They taste sticky and cold death.

Xenophobia

This place is of death, and I

Belong to anywhere else.

In my place lives dress in many

Shades, from infant to old age.

There, the death is only a visitor.

Occasionally it may lure some to go

With it, and they never return.

Here, in this place, lives spend in cages.

They sit, stand, eat, and wait to die.

Some come out of eggs, and some from

Mothers whom they never see again.

Some have two legs/wings and others four,

Yet no use; they don’t know what is

Life in infancy, childhood, teenage,

Youth, middle age, and old age.

They eat and drink whatever they get,

They don’t know any other tastes

Like a worm or fly from among the bush,

A different vine, or fresh grass,

Or occasionally a long-bean’s vine,

Or banana skin or jack fruit leftover

As the grandmothers of our place

Give them every other day or river water.

To grow fatty and fast to death

They were given extra magic potions

Through injections or through food.

They don’t have any feelings; they just

Don’t cry as it happens in our place

When a calf is gone astray.

For them life is monotonous, no

Childhood nor motherhood,

No illness nor recovery.

Their wings are never opened.

They never get wet in rain nor

See the sun rises and sets,

As in my place where the cows moo

Either to go out to the meadow in sun rise

Or to go home before dark, to their clean sheds.

This is the land of death and I fear

To come here and hate to stay.

If you live here it is either to kill or die,

But I am not for both.

The Connecting Dot

Yore the fort stands

            from another era

kissing the pale cheek

            of horizon.

The road towards it

            lays bare skinned

with scars and stains

            from mindless travellers;

clean or dirty – who cares

            what is that under their feet!

Wearing the rainbow

            from their dreams

two legged or four legged

            (or leg-less) tread it,

hoping to reach, again, back

            to the fort of a golden era.

Now there are no wars

            out there

but inside all brains

            with weapons of more precision.

The tree, trying to stand

            witness, for centuries,

            as a connecting dot,

has twisted branches,

            crossed and twirled,

with many a knot

            along their lengths.

Wearing the rainbow

            from their dreams

still so many sell and buy

            their moments

under its vast shade.

Voices Within - Complete List of Poets :: Setu, January 2019