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Your smile

 

Like a curtain rippling at the door

your smile

 

I step forward—

And your smile spreads

Like fresh pressed oil on water

 

In the morning

when no shadows form on the floor

it alights like sunshine in an egg

Springs back like an unlatched window

And like a small road, it falls in step

accompanying me for a long while

 

Your smile

falls like seeds into the soil

Jamun like eyes well up with relish

And look, colour blue—

my teeth.

 

 

तुम्हारी हँसी

 

दरवाज़े पर लहराते पर्दे जैसी

तुम्हारी हँसी

 

मैं बढ़ता क़दम—

और फैल जाती तुम्हारी हँसी

पानी पर कच्चे तेल की तरह

 

सुबह के समय

जब ज़मीन पर नहीं बनतीं परछाइयाँ

अण्डे में धूप—सी उतर आती

खिड़की के खुलने सी लपकती वापिस

और पगडण्डी—सी चलती

देर तक साथ

 

तुम्हारी हँसी

पृथ्वी पर बीज—सी झरती

जामुन जैसी आँखों में भर आता स्वाद

और नीले पड़ जाते देखो—

मेरे दाँत।

 

 

Translation from the Hindi to the English by Carol D’Souza

The Hindi poem by Sourav Roy

The poem is selected from Roy’s latest collection Kaal Baisakhi, Vani Prakashan, 2022, page 25.

 

Carol D’Souza lives in Chennai. A collation of her work can be found at linktr.ee/cblaizd. Her poetry in English has previously appeared in ASAP|art, The Sunflower Collective, Almost Island, EKL Review, Hakara, Indian Cultural Forum, voice & verse, the Economic and Political Weekly, and elsewhere. It is forthcoming in Qurbatein. Her translation of Uday Prakash and Amrita Pritam’s poetry from Hindi to English is forthcoming in the Red River Anthology of Twenty First Century Hindi Poets and Usawa Literary Review respectively.
Sourav Roy is a bilingual writer, poet, journalist, and translator. He currently works as a teacher, and has been a visiting faculty at Azim Premji University and NIFT Bengaluru in the past. He is also a core member of Anjuman, a literary club that promotes Hindi-Urdu literature in Bengaluru. A blogger since 2010, Sourav has worked as an Editor at YourStory Media in the past, where he wrote about India’s social sector. He continues to write regularly for Bengaluru Review and Deccan Herald newspaper. His published work includes Kaal Baisakhi, Yayavar (Collections of poems) Karnakavita (Editor: Anthology of Hindi-Urdu poetry from Bengaluru), Teen Natak by Abhishek Majumdar (Editor), Soho Mein Marx (Translator: 3 Plays by Howard Zinn), and Os Ki Prithvi (Translation of Japanese Haiku).

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