Dara

 

P.M. Narayanan

Translated from Malayalam by Bindu K.C.

Dara was unaware,

He sat alone

In one of the many private chambers

Of his sprawling palace.

He held a quill

Paint dripping from it. 

A half-finished portrait

The painting of a young gardener

With her pitcher balancing on her hips,

Watering the plants. 

 

He remembered: 

Bygone evenings,

Past nights.

Those broken stories,

Shattered in the moonlight of Yamuna’s sands.

Those lilting songs,

Melting into the atmosphere,

While reclining on those flower-beds

Under the garden bowers. 

Her farewell

That drizzled down his chest,

Yesterday night,

When he sneaked into her humble hut,

Escaping the surveilling eyes of

His own guards. 

He sat, his gaze fixed,

On those long lashed, half bloomed

Pair of eyes on the canvas. 

With a deep sorrow,

With deep ecstasy, 

His hands drawing,

He didn’t hear the door unlocking,

He didn’t feel his younger brother’s sword

Descending on his neck,

Lightening swift. 

He was in the land of the moonlight

That never sets. 

He was in the land of flowers,

That never wither.   

 

* Dara Shikoh was the eldest son of the Mughal emperor, Shah Jahan.  Dara was said to be a thinker and philosopher. 

 

 

 

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[1] Dara Shikoh was the eldest son of the Mughal emperor, Shah Jahan.  Dara was said to be a thinker and philosopher.