Books n Notes

7 फरवरी को किंशुक गुप्त नाम के युवा लेखक से अनुराधा सिंह की इस कविता के अनुवाद का वादा किया था। आज पूरा कर रहा हूं।
यह अनुवाद कवि अनुराधा सिंह के नये संग्रह के आगमन पर एक भेंट की तरह:

Being Close

A man lifts his gun
And pumps bullets into
The woman who lived secure
Under his watch.

A woman offers the man a garland, then
Bending to touch his feet,
Pushes a button on her person.
Life is blown apart,
Leaving a pair of white Lotto shoes behind.

You stand so close to me
That I forget the wind's natural smell,
That my lips quiver
At a single movement of your eye,
That the dream of a touch has fallen away from between us,
That I can't see
If your finger is on a gun's trigger
Or the button of an explosive.
------
क़ुर्ब
-अनुराधा सिंह
एक आदमी बंदूक उठाता है
अपनी रक्षा में रह रही स्त्री को
भून देता है
एक औरत पहनाती है पुष्पहार
करते हुए चरणवंदन, अपनी देह में लगा
बटन दबा देती है
परखच्चे उड़ जाते हैं जीवन के
शेष रह जाता है सफ़ेद लोट्टो जूता

तुम मेरे पास हो इतने
कि मैं हवाओं की सहज गंध भूल गयी हूँ
इतने कि मेरे होंठ काँपते हैं
तुम्हारी दृष्टि की हलचल से भी
इतने कि हमारे मध्य
अब स्पर्श का स्वप्न भी शेष नहीं
इतने कि
नहीं देख पा रही
तुम्हारा हाथ बन्दूक के घोड़े पर है
या धमाके के बटन पर.

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Back to Previous
Impossible Friendships
By Adam Zagajewski
Translated by Clare Cavanagh
For example, with someone who no longer is,
who exists only in yellowed letters.

Or long walks beside a stream,
whose depths hold hidden

porcelain cups—and the talks about philosophy
with a timid student or the postman.

A passerby with proud eyes
whom you'll never know.

Friendship with this world, ever more perfect
(if not for the salty smell of blood).

The old man sipping coffee
in St.-Lazare, who reminds you of someone.

Faces flashing by
in local trains—

the happy faces of travelers headed perhaps
for a splendid ball, or a beheading.

And friendship with yourself
—since after all you don't know who you are.

Adam Zagajewski, "Impossible Friendships" from Eternal Enemies. Copyright © 2008 by Adam Zagajewski. Used by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux, LLC, http://us.macmillan.com/fsg. All rights reserved.

Caution: Users are warned that this work is protected under copyright laws and downloading is strictly prohibited. The right to reproduce or transfer the work via any medium must be secured with Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC.
Source: Eternal Enemies (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008)

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Impossible Friendships
By Adam Zagajewski
About this Poet

Adam Zagajewski was born in Lvov, Poland, in 1945; as an infant he was relocated with his family to western Poland. He lived in Berlin for a couple of years, moved to France in 1982, and has taught at universities in the United States, including...
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Home - Farrar, Straus and Giroux Founded in 1946, Farrar, Straus and Giroux is renowned for publishing an international list of literary fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and children’s books. FSG authors have won extraordinary acclaim, including numerous National Book Awards, Pulitzer Prizes, and Nobel Prizes in Literature.