Kuffir has very kindly translated my poem ‘The Nizam’s Wives’ into Telugu. Sadly, I can’t read the language but for those who can, it’s here at his blog Fakeeram. And here is the original:
The Nizam’s Wives
Four girls in brocade, tussar
and stiff smiles, the slow stranglehold
of gold on their hands, necks, faces.
They were the children who aged early.
Were they friends? Did they
share their fractured power
while swapping dolls, diamonds
and nights? Or were their eyes
darting and vicious over the kheer?
Did they avoid the bath at certain times?
Perhaps, three of them colluded
against the fourth, leaving
frogs on her bed,
peas under her mattress,
spit in her tea.
We can’t know. In this photograph,
they’re just four girls
released from purdah,
frightened and unblinking
into the cameraman’s flash.
***
Originally published at Kritya.
i find slight changes from the poem published on kritya (which i could last night, but not now). ‘pudding’ has changed to ‘kheer’, i see..that is translatable..perhaps, you edited after publication? thanks for posting it again.
Oh but I love it! Can’t you publish this over at UV? It’s just so beautiful.
Really nice. Got me wanting to see the photograph. If there was one.
I liked the end particularly, the idea of the girls being released from purdah into the cameraman’s flash.
@kuffir: Yeah, I think I edited slightly after publication in Kritya. I keep doing that. Thanks again for the translation.
@OJ: Thank you…hmm, didn’t think of that. Maybe, I will one of these days.
@Banno: Thank you. There was a photograph. It was part of an exhibition on the Nizams that was running at the museum in Delhi two years ago. It had just the three wives and they looked so similarly young and vulnerable, haunted even. Yet there were hints of their different personalities as well — one had something strong about the eyes, another had more expressive hands. It was very intriguing.