THE GIRL ON THE SEVENTEENTH FLOOR
-
K.
Satchidanandan (India)
I stay on the seventeenth
floor.
The moon can see my
solitude.
But I cannot touch her
sky.
I can see the sea below.
Inside it too there is a
sky.
Behind me is a sea of
slums.
There is no sky there.
My violinresounds on both
sides.
My weeping too.
Both speak the same
tongue.
There are no flowers
anywhere.
The painted city stretches
in front of me
Waiting for her
night-visitors.
2
I can now see a desert
growing
At a distance.
It was all green, with
A lake at the centre
Full of water-lilies.
It was in front of our
eyes
That the desert was born,
And the sand from the
dried-up lake
Came ashore.
It ate up all green like a
pre-historic beast.
Only the skeletons of
plants
And trees were left on the
sand.
3
One day this sea too will
Turn into desert.
I can see it coming up
with the wind
To take over my
seventeenth floor.
And devouring the whole
city.
Then I will turn into a
cactus.
A flower, reluctant, will
bloom on me.
Around it there will
appear
Honeybees, bears,
Green-hued humans
Under green stars.
(Translated by the
poet, 2021)
****