Poems on the Hills*
VIII
The hill wakes up
long before the birds rise
and long before the sun rises
leaving its doorway open,
it assembles everyday at the village well
with a pitcher full of suffering.
People say that time itself changes
And heralds change.
The change might have come knocking on the door elsewhere.
But here in this hill there's no way to come walking.
The trails themselves flow down slides
and the hill stands alone as a peninsula
every year.
Right after I stepped into this hill
I have been a witness to the same sight-
The hill wakes up
long before the birds rise
and long before the sun rises.
Leaving behind its doorway open
it assembles everyday at the village well
with a pitcher full of suffering.
(Translated from Nepali by Mukul Dahal)
XI
Every season
people climbed up the mountains,
their heavy boots crushing the white snow.
They reach the summit,
celebrate their victory
and return home with faces
glowing with glory.
But the truth is:
they return
without ever having trodden
on the mountain-top.
The genuine mountain
always mounts the back of the villagers
and walks up and down
between the low plains and the peaks.
Shedding glaciers of sweat
the real mountain
stands tall on the heaps of trouble
and enjoys
making people its own slave.
Climbers!
You must tread on this second mountain
or drop the idea of taking pride
in having conquered the heights.
(Translated from Nepali by Manu Manjil)
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* The poems are the extracts of a series Poems on the Hills collected in Poems on the Hills (2007).
