Poetry: Rudra Kinshuk

Rudra Kinshuk
1. Parenting

They say that parenting
is an art of planting
in a desert.

Life teaches otherwise.
Unlearning often
becomes inevitable.

In my garden hibiscus
grows in abundance
for my dark mother.

Hers is a way of acceptance.

Parenting is a way of worship
of the soul.
Don’t indulge in rituals.

Parenting is no teaching
but a way of unlearning.

 
2. Fragrance of Sawdust

Dipping biscuits
Into steaming tea
is really a difficult task,
like falling in love
with a married one.

An insect finds itself
wriggling
in dew-sunned web of magic.

Is zero is a void
or fullness in disguise?
 
An old sawmill nearby.
Fragrance of sawdust
gets everything
overwhelmed as if the spring is all around.


3. Weeds in My Garden

It is presumed a weed
is a mole on the body
of my garden.

Every when and then
I attempt to remove,
I find out an excuse
of not doing so.
Who wants to bear
a slaughter house within?

Procrastination is not
always a state of indecision.
Sometimes it’s a discovery
of a Buddha
within this carnivorous self.

Weeds sometimes break into
buds of pink and blue.


4. For the Distant Star

The distant star in the blue
twinkles in silence.
Its whisper breaks into dewdrops
on the blades of grass.

Dhimal, the boy speaks
is music to me in this small village
of North Bengal.

Should I kneel here for the whole night
under this leparded sky and weep?
God is tears in silence, a remembrance of seeds.

For the distant star I’ll wait
another life of fragrant roots,
another life of water and pebbles.


5. Summer at Totopara

Tourist eyes look at them, strange,
mother and daughter,
picking up lice from hair.

Extinguished fire under trees
speaks of them who left .
And adventures of Ishpa god
recede silently into forgetfulness.

Tourists find only the pebbles,
but one who smells wisp of fragrance
of water underneath
is a lover.

Summer at Totopara
ends in the anecdotes of Pidua,
the back-faced demon
and withering rivers.


6. Memoir

Memory, a bird of silence
moves towards the blue horizon.
Leaves rustle and tearful seeds
burst into life.
Horses of earth
graze on the celestial pastures.

You promised to return one morning
by the obeisant  paddy.
The evening settles down
on the tree-tops of Garhjungle.

The fort of Ichhai withered and cold,
by the golden sands of the river Ajoy
recounts the weeping tales
of Mother Shyamarupa.

Come, my dear bird,
come back again
to this land of rains
and dark seeds
to soothe the loving soul…

Note:  Ichhai , a character in Dharma Mangal was
a worshiper of the Goddess Durga as Mother Shyamarupa.


7 .The Lone Traveller
(In Memory of David McCutchion)

From the dawn to twilight
you walk among ruins
to listen to the whispers of stones
your camara got flashing on melting shadows
disappearing into the jaws,
the eternal dictates of time.

Yet love is an enigmatic muskdeer
charmed with ephemeral fragrance.

The deul temple
near the forest of Goddess Shyamarupa
evokes the memory of a weeping love.

Before the setting of the final dark
a collective howl of jackals
over the puddles of the river Ajay beside
to signal the beginning of a new retrospective.


Bio: A poet, critic and translator, Rudra Kinshuk (born 1971) is an Indian poet writing poetry in English. He has contributed poems and translations to numerous international journals.  He has authored several books of poetry. He has written his doctoral dissertation on ‘Representation of the Subaltern in Contemporary Bangla Novels’.
Contact: Rudra Kinshuk, Ramakrishna Pally, Bolpur, West Bengal, India, Pin-731204
Email: rudrakinshuk@gmail.com

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