Aghanashini

sea is just a destiny that stays outside our land
but the body of water that flows from its heart
and fills all the homes with treasures of food grains
and with it takes every shard, every broken part
of the profane, pitiless and pervert human brains!
that again which floods the dirtiest streets
and cleans up every dark corner covered with cob-webs
bringing life to every object that it meets
culminating its crests and troughs into decent ebbs:
i speak of the river that seeps through the sand.

not because of its vigour nor for its glory
not at all because it has a name so pure
(Aghanashini, it is that seems to have a story
whatever it may be, i am not too sure)
not because near Sirsi it has two origins
not for its name meaning "destroyer of sins"
no, not for any other reason that i sing of it
but because i have a history that seems fit
to sing for Aghanashini, and its majestic falls:
for while its journey this river makes calls
on to a hamlet, up there at the north of the state
where there must be a home i have never seen
which belonged to some one who grew to hate
me and my fantasies, and that a fool i have been.

if only this river could ablute myself
and make me pure and restore me back
my own dignity and by virtue of itself
transform my woes into a bountiful stack.

-Siddartha Pamulaparty

January 10-11, 2007.