ABSENCE
["Absence" is a poetic piece i originally composed in Nepali: one of a few, rare, poetic compositions i had originally done in Nepali and later translated into English. A lot of people speaking in a video inspired me to read out this poem on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMle6pFrNzk
My voice does not sound beautiful, or attractive, or pleasant — a hoarsely croaking throat as that of a frog suffering from cold! And that too required my waiting until late night hours for a couple of days to record the audio on my mobile phone: man-made noises fill the air around me most of the time and that disturbs my peace, my quietude, my concentration!!
The text, the video clips, the audio, all are my original. The video clips were filmed on an Android handset and later combined and edited."Absence" is a void of desperation, an emptiness of being alone (not that of choosing to be, but...), a weariness that oftentimes hits us all; and the tiredness, the defeat, the giving up, the surrender... i try to fill it with what i can create (otherwise i have far fewer privileges! ), and fell grateful for what there is; otherwise there is not much in there!!! There is an absence...
In all this absence, thank you for being.]
-----------------
i
at once
a loss of existence!
picked up by some stranger
and pocketed along
a road to an alien land!
dropped somewhere
i, a friend for play!
Time’s overflow
but closed by Death’s embrace!
a bridge between two worlds
crossed over
again and again!
unheld tight to some bosom
and thrown away from
the very heart!
but still
grasped by some unknown hand
to be filled once
with an empty life!
somewhere,
someplace
under manhunt,
i, the unfound one!
in between life and death,
among crowd after crowd
of people, i,
the unassimilated one!
and yet entangled
alone in a stranger web
a sky that had wept without tears!
i am,
and yet i am not!
unwoven
ash after a dream!
just as such
the absence that is me,
nowhere noplace
the un-existence that is me!
of relations
of connections
among the whirlwinds of them all
i, the untolerated one
the non-existent one
the un-present one
i,
the absence…
silence…!
कुनै समय
कतै हराएको मान्छे म!
कुनै अपरिचितले टपक्क टिपेर
पोल्टामा राखि हिँडेको---
गुमनाम देशको बाटो!
कतै फुत्त खसेको
म, एउटा
खेल्ने साथी!
समयको बाढी
मृत्यूले काखी च्यापेको म!
पटक पटक ओहोर दोहोर गरेको
दुई दुनियाँको साँघु!
कसैले उठाएर छातीमा टाँस्न
नसकेको
मनदेखि कतै फ्याँकिएको म!
तर पनि
कसैले च्पाप्प हात समातेर
एक पटकलाई भरिएको रित्तो
जिवन!
कहिँ
कतै
खोज्दा खोज्दै
नभेटिएको म!
जिवन र मरणको बिचतिर
मानिसहरुको भिड्---
तर पनि कतै नसमेटिएको म!
एक्लै एक्लै एउटा अनौठो
जालोमा अल्झेर
बिना आँसु रोएको आकाश!
म छु
र पनि छैन।
नसँगालिएको,
सपना पछिको खरानी!
यस्तै यस्तै नभएको म,
कहिँ कतै नरहेको म!
नाता र सम्बन्धको
भुमरीहरु माझ
कहिँ कसैले नसहेको म!
हुँदै नभएको म,
कतै नरहेको म!!
* * * * * * *
(Poem originally written in English; later translated into Nepali by the author. © Subarna Prasad Acharya, 2016, 2017; all rights reserved. Read out on YouTube by the author. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMle6pFrNzk )
