Penned: Bina Theeng Tamang

 Maichyangs in a Black Hole

Penned: Bina Theeng Tamang

Poet: Bina Theeng Tamang

Trans. Hem Bishwakarma

To wake up with birds

To sing bird’s song

To run a Marathon to water tap

To grind the fortune in a grinding-stone

Or, husk themselves persistently

On a mortar of grief

All are the routine of Maichyangs

 

Maichyangs breastfeed to their children

Not the milk— the blood

Sturdy their thighs

But wither and slender they

Tangle their bones to a ghum[2]

That covers them in the monsoon-

While plantation into tears

As if the tears are soft mud

 

Tears are sharp enough

That they use to cut grass

Collect firewoods

 

Tears are the palms

That they use to clean up the dunghill

And rinse their anxiety

For the years,

They tuned the primitive note

And played the Damphu[3]

Chorused the Selo[4]

Visited to the bazaar of their body

And walked nonstop in search of a luminosity

They still walk

 

Yet, I want to ask

Why does not appear

The line of prosperity

On the palms of Maichyangs?

Why does not appear apparent

A canal of contentment?

This all are broken on their hands

As if they are fragmented

With the relatives while walking

And they happened to reach a cliff

While growing the chock; shoots sprout

Catching the fringe of chock- life

Maichayangs ready passports

Strive for the visas

Then reach to a black hole

Where the dreamers reach

Then disappear to its dark.

[1] A young lady in Tamang language

[2] A covering made of bamboo strips and leaves

[3] A hand-drum played by Tamang

[4] A Tamang song