Badal Chamling
A flowery home is the sweetest
With Gnaphalium, Bougainvillea
Or, say, with Cape jasmine!
It endows with no breathe
However
It grounds, incubating life and living things.
Such a house is called a batoghar, a wayside house
As it stands alongside the lanes
It’s Dharapanighar, as it roots are near the well
So is the Tinghar
And so on.
It doesn’t need fertile soil to effloresce
Nor morass and dumpishness to be greenish and fresh
Neither anyone’s assistance to be glorious
Nor any costume to attire.
Nectarous is its aroma
It reaches early morning
Fresh whey from is found skylarking on the yard
Maize, soybean roasted in a roasting pan wafts to your nose
A sweet sour smell of gunduk and sinki—
What an odor!
It lets your mouth fill with water.
People shed tears in hard knocks
Flowery homes deal as usual
The sun toughens in its teens
Flowery homes stay calm forever.
A flowery home showers motherly concern upon us
It is much warmer than the sun and moon
Do sprawl on its lap
Heavenly-coverlet and earthy-bed are found hither.
The flowery homes dwell in my village.
[Badal Chamling is a Nepali poet from Itahari. Patheghar and Birya Jameen are her poetry collections. He is a schoolteacher by profession.]