Permission

By Prollas Sindhuliya

Clasping her residual miseries 
Together with her kids
There stands with me
A woman. 

I am not one of her kinsmen from mother’s side
Nor a relative from father’s side
She had come someday rushing like a cascade
Leaving behind all her friends and acquaintances 
Who were once close to her,
And had emptied someday in me
As does a river into another
To get assimilated into one another.

A thin line of vermillion
Flows down the canal of decency
Making a string of poté* a barrage
Love is the definition of our journey
Destined to move together in bounds 
She as one bank and I another; 
We are tied 
To the same traditional bond called love
If it has to break
It is easier for a dam to break
And the exuberance that follows the break-up
Is perhaps even more exhilarating. 

We dry at times
Rejuvenate and resurrect 
Flow with a gush now
Become turbid and clean up again
And move ahead
Inevitably passing through the cyclical points
Of drying, rejuvenating, resurrecting, gushing
Getting turbid or cleaning up ! 

In this journey of cooperation
How much share do I constitute?
And how much of it she does? 
Or else,
Is she more of it, and I lesser? 

Once we are destined to flow together,
Flowing in my name would do too
Or flowing in her name
Would mean flowing as well 
If one of us were turbid
We would still flow, cleaning up
No matter in whose names we flow
Flowing, in the dictionary of life
Is flowing with incessant sedimentation 
And expanding each moment
We are cleaning up, and so we are flowing too
We are flowing, and are expanding too. 

With dreams all messed with algal growth
And her children clasped in her arms
There stands a woman with me 
At the airport gate !

With half her misery clasped underneath my armpit
Half her scarcities tied into a bundle
Half her cravings deferred sine die,
I am preparing to move to Gulf.

At this moment
I am unable to surmise
Whose permissions I need most—
The state’s
Or the maiden’s.

Trans : Mahesh Paudyal

[Prollas Sindhuliya (b. 1975) is a Nepali poet and essayist of high repute. He also edits Kathalika, a quarterly magazine based on fiction. His published works include his poetry collections Bahir Ek Muthi Tusaro Chha, Shabdaharuko Nepathya, Chupchap Antya, Jhandalai DV Paryo Bhane Ke Hunchha, Aankhabhari Bhuinkuiro and Janmajaat Bahunko Bigyapti, essay collection Kalpana Pandey Dudh Haleko Chiya Khanchhe and novel Sunya Degree. He lives in Kathmandu with his family.]