The Flow of Time

Telugu poem by Prof N. Gopi, translated by Dr. K. Rajamouly

The sea

Is the warrior-struggle

In its stance

It cannot get sleep

Until it throws off the shore

Time with its folds of tides

In fact, the sea does not sleep

Its nature is a constant conflict.

When the sun rises late with red eyes

It showers water at the sun

Letting it free from rust

When the moon softly provokes

It rises so high to hit it

When the stars mock above

It teaches them wisdom

By throwing shells

Time does not keep quiet

Casts the net of darkness

To let the fishes freed

The sea struggles

Some conspiracies surround as storms

It is making a hole to its heart

Showers blood-rain

Changing its mind,

Time approaches the sea as a ship.

It keeps time in it and leads to shore

Water and time become one

And blow in the waves of compromise

How wonderfully creates the emotional scene!

The moustache raised by time

Spreads the fun of bubbles

Now the sea

Touches the head like mother

23 JUN 18

(From Kalanni Nidra Ponivvanu, pp 31-2)

(Trans. by Dr. Rajamouly Katta)

Published: Poetcrit 37.1 (January - June 2024)

I Swing in Joy

O Cuckoo! You are my favorite guest

For you fill my heart with smiles

You let my past flow in your notes sweetest

It is lovely cud I love to chew all miles.

Your arrival is most welcome to my region.

For my heart swings in joy in your notes

The choice-notes of your gifted throats

I feel your advent as the event happiest

As the most celebrated fest.

My heart blooms like the flower

My lips sing with the joys of your tunes,

My steps dance in grace to your rhythms

I fly on the wings to the realms of my memoirs

My native land with its pretty features

With their glow and glitz

Lit by sunrays, moonbeams, star-twinkles,

The earthly paradise, heavenly mirth on earth

That stands before me vibrant in image.

I swim in the rivulet that flows by my village

With all my boyhood friends,

Playing in sand, building dunes beside the flow.

To the north, my village tank

I sail in it on the tides to reach the bank

I leap like fish in the overflow as a sport

All the beauties to sensor hustle and bustle,

The sights of the flowers of creepers,

The gallop of rabbits and deer amid thistles.

All in mind remind me of all nostalgic joys

When days fled like hours and years like days

Jubilance of victories on my merits in studies

As a topper to enjoy applauses,

All the glows shone in my revered teachers’ faces.

Published: Poetcrit 37.1 (January - June 2024) 

Seed’s Autobiography

I am single for my struggle

Yet complete with life full

With vigor and power to fill

In my heart with aims all,

I am one to turn hundreds,

Thousands and lakhs,

Millions and billions,

The microcosm in my miniature

To macrocosm of my stature

In the years and years to come.

To reach my cherished goal

I start my traverse

From the womb of soil, my mother

With the moisture of my father

And the sunrays my well-wisher.

I live tiny but serve many

And all, their hungers,

And their tactile pleasures.

My life is not for my life

But for the lives of all, a sacrifice

Selfless service.

How tiny I am for the yeoman

For lessons to man to be human!

Let all learn from my life.

My journey from the soil

With me sown at the furrow of the plow

To grow in exuberance in glow

In full sheen of floral eminence

Pollination for my renewal

As germination of my children.

Published: Poetcrit 37.1 (January - June 2024)