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With the Night

By Krishna Prasai

He observed me
from top, to the toes.
It was all his choice;
he happened to like the eyes more.
In the second discourse, he asked my race
and more words spewed, as booze grew high.
In the course of our talks,
he asked my name, surname and the country.
Then as questioned waned, he embarked on the last one,
and asked me my cost, without a daunt.
Highly inebriated he was.
When the costs of life,
and that of the body
and of all the parts were settled,
he bought my body in the end
by kilograms, and played with it, nightlong.
He played, unleashing the groove.
He played to his satiety.

The body I sold,
was of no much worth to me
and I had nothing to conceal.
Selling had become mandatory for me,
in order to keep living.

The first night, I entered town from the country,
I stitched my youth, like this, with the town
as a sewing machine does,
in the name of living,
accomplished by sewing youths.

My youth,
and the glow on the countenance
and that sacrifice
I had entrusted to a night
out of a compromise.
And, for the first time
I tendered everything I had
to that urban night!

At present too, he is adept,
and I am habituated too.
Familiar, like us, is the time.
With the same antique trip,
he plays with me,
and I with him
and both of us play
with the night.
Trans: Mahesh Paudyal

[Krishna Prasai (1960) is a Nepali poet, essayist, and story writer. He is the chairperson of Jara Foundation, a literary and cultural organization of high repute in Nepali. He is also the pioneer of Zen Poetry in Nepal, and his Zen poems have been translated into several international languages including Thai, Burmese, Assamese, Sinhala, Bangla, Hindi, Chinese, Korean, English, and German etc. Mr. Prasai edited Nepali Samasamayik Kavitahroo, an anthology of contemporary Nepali poetry when he was just 24 years old and exhibited a rare literary talent he possessed. Till date, the works Mr. Prasai has published include Gham Nabhayeko Bela (poems), Ghamko Barsha (Zen poems), Prakshepan (stories), Anubhootika Chhalharoo (travel essays), Never Say Goodbye (poems in English) and many other works published in isolation.]

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