THE DREAM OF ARULLAMMAA WHO HAS WADED THROUGH THE SORROW-STRUCK SPAN OF TIME

In the face-to-face session with this old lady
who has lost all her precious times
in incessant and irreparable destruction
Words have turned frozen.
The dream of life that lies dormant in her voices
and her hunger that remains
non-satiated
She keeps telling again and again

AruLlammaa who had escaped from dreadful moments and returned
has her eyes filled with God.
In the Land of immensely deep perils
they have brought her times in a chair.
Arullammaa’s ever elongating prayers
grow bigger than the size of God.
The dream for Life remains frozen in the words of Life
that has come to its close with nothing but disappointments.

The tales she has in store
laden with the cruel experiences of War
And her body that has refused to
explode and scatter into bits
Her long, full-fledged life that has
refused to be silenced
keep nurturing never-ending dreams.
The old lady who has defied the War
keeps sharing with the kids
the Great Tale of Colossal Destruction
Arullammaa is speaking to the children about nothing else
but the unrealized dreams
______________

A poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled
THUYAR MIGUNDHA KAALATHI KADANDHA ARULLAMMAAVIN KANAVU
Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan

(Thanks: Pongu Thamizh)

THE GREAT LAND : WEARING ALL WOUNDS IT STANDS THERE SMILING

(A lot more news yet to be accessed lie there, buried deep in that Great Land)

Deaths that none have yet realized in full
Keep seeping on the seashore of Nandhi-Kadarkarai.
The cassettes that entwine all kinds of tortures in a long chain
The troops watch in their exclusive night Channels
as a great pastime.
In the great land captured by the accused and criminals
all that are desired are being carried out.


In the ground where men, holding tight their dreams
were so buried
they have planted the soldier who holds the gun
that reminds everything-
the soldier filled with venom and violence
keeps showing his gory face on all sides
of the Great Land

He keeps elaborating on his glorious tales
of defeating and annihilating the people of the land.
Splashing his victory song up above the sky
He drenches the whole land with it.
In the region where entry is prohibited to children
With Death oozing out and pervading
The demonic women having skeletons tied in their legs
keep performing their terrorizing dances.


Wherever the Emperor of the Song of Valour and Victory treads
Death and Blood are being felt.
With the voices murmuring and turning silent
everything is buried down under.
The soldier who is made to stand there by the Emperor
adorned by the garland of victory
Is busily giving out the tales of those fallen
and the ways in which they were made to fall
releasing their visuals in photographs

Wearing all wounds the Great Land stands there smiling.
_____________________
9.12.2009 (Thanks to Pongu Thamizh)

A poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled PERUNILAM: KAAYANGALAI ANINDHU PUNNAGAITHUK-KONDIRUKKIRADHU

Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan

WHAT DO THE CHILDREN WANT?

The children have got their wide range of responses
from the query of the Emperor.
In the street elongated in a maze
all the children entwining their hands, ask
what the children want
Listening to the query
The Emperor responds saying
that it is the Time being offered by Him.
With he saying further that
it is prosperous and so full of Liberty and Equality
the Children begin their queries
from the very words of the Emperor.

The Emperor has applied his smile of absolute power
on all the syllables and words
and he turns towards the children
the face that turns them terror-stricken.
In the book designed by his numerous brains that
exploits and swindles the world of children
He speaks of children and children alone.

He who had snatched away and plundered everything
from the hands of children
He who has shaped the monstrous Time
that has plunged the children in terrible gloom
declares that he is going to gift the prosperous Time
of Cruelties to the kids.
The children know everything.

The children do not want
that Power that shrouds everything
and allow them to rot
all the while scattering on all sides
a Smile
The children do not want
the aims and objectives that
devovouring one’s natural self
imprisons with all too evil schemes
The children do not want
those thoughts that have gifted Curses
and destroyed Histories
and have become so wide-spread
The Emperor keeps wounding
the children’s tender hearts
with his responses
and their eyes
with his smile.

________________________

A Poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled

KUZHANDHAIGAL AASAIPADUVADHU ENNA?

Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan

THE BOY WOULD COME BACK

Just the way his mother believes
Just the way his father and brother believes
Let us also believe that he would come back.
But, where are those ways today?
It was with many children
many little boys
that he had disappeared.

My dear friend!
The whole stretch of the Great Land
has tasted defeat
with the blood of children everywhere.
In the elegies and obituary-notes being written
all too unexpectedly
I had to write one for him too.
Having to write elegies for kids and little ones
causes pain unbearable as a terrible Curse.
That your words were waiting for him, I know

You were searching some detention camp
and some prison
running from one to other.
Someone had seen
his torn pants.
That the shells would swallow children
and kill them
That boy knew very well.
Witnessing all the deaths taking place
right in front of him
He remained terrorized to the core.

Will our little ones smile again?
In the land where he was dissolved
Ii what hues and shades will the flowers bloom
Hence forth?
Oh, where would he have taken and preserved
His face and smile?

My dear friend!
Please keep the books for him.
Completing all his exercises and home-work
He would return to class.
That he would return, retrieving all that had been kept hidden
Let us also believe.
____________________________
(To Dharmegan who was killed in the War)
A poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled
ANDHACH CHIRUVAN THIRUMBI VARUVAAN
Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan

THE PAGE THAT WAS KEPT CLOSED FOR THE BLOODY DIOLOGUE

A poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled

RATHAM VADIGIRA URAIYAADALUKKAAI MOODAPATTIRUNDHA PAKKAM
Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan
___________________
O1

Though I thought of
writing down in some form of note
the all too secret a call
that shuts all the doors real tight
I wrote and sent it in a brief sms
which would reach belatedly
and I wiped off
the blood streaming down my face
in utter secrecy

covering everything with the help of very thick ‘padangu’
I remain quiet, not revealing any of the
actions being initiated against me.

For three hours networking was closed.
Yet again I searched for
Real dense words.

That the drawings in our ancestral house
and the big bold words engraved there
are indeed very peace-loving
- so I have told them.
All the telephone-calls that came my way
I was sending back.

Hereafter nothing will be told to you
Through these Poems.
The dialogue that I had in that blood-sucked and dried-up carpet
The blood that flowed in the words and lost for ever
I have no intention of sharing any of those things.
This page wherein the explanation is to be given
remains empty.

02

My friend and Myself went on laughing
during all those
terrible words
we were throwing away the eyes
and the misery of defeat
that have come to spread upon our face
under the fence
and through the thorny wires
into the adjacent ‘Kaani’.
They were swallowing us
in a demonic speed.

The way the riffle piercing our face
tearing and engaging us in a diologue
sucking our blood
We won’t tell these to anyone.
That none threaten us
- so we have issued a statement on our own.

After the dialogue
for how long
these all too terrifying words
would be seeping behind this Motor-cycle.

That the actions initiated against me
proved so very sweet -
I had written on that late evening
at length in this page.
My friend and Myself
are not going to tell anything about the blocked website
That we have observed about Time proving
real sweet and great
for all things concerned –
so they hold about the bloody dialogue of that day.
-----------------------------------------------------
(25.11.2009)

YET AGAIN MOTHER HAS ANNOUNCED A DATE

A Poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled
AMMA MEELAVUM ORU THIGADHI ARIVITHIRUKKIRAAL
TRANSLATED into English by Latha Ramakrishnan

___________________
The dates marked in n the calendar having days utterly spent out
Are losing the hues and shades applied on them.
That arrangements are made for home-coming -
Mother has announced yet another date.
In the house of someone
Our food is being cooked.
On the evening of the day before when it was announced
that Mother’s application to leave was accepted
I bought and kept ready the rice and
vegetables.

Along the path where the rotten buses that have
long since completed their life-span
covered from head to food in dust
keep coming along
In a bus that refuses to move ahead
Mother comes
Tying tight her hair that is yet to grow
comes kid sister
This city is singing about their smile
that has been eaten away by the scorching Sun.
The paths of the city branch out
in different directions.
While bringing Mother along
who keeps on waiting
with the dates going past
holding the refugee-bags
verifying the landmarks
bearing the burdens of Time
the people of the Great Land keeps wandering.

That there is no home to return
nor any address for letters to reach -
Mother keeps saying.


As a wandering refugee with no home
Nor address
I bring the bag with my attires which was kept
in someone’s house
to another someone’s place.
Each and every house
Each and every street
turning into miserable refugees
we keep wandering.
While coming from one city to another
I am getting displaced again and again.
In the earthen pot of someone unknown
the lunch is getting ready.
Right from the heavy carry-bags
everything is sharing and distributing words.

In the city full of wandering refugees
Mother says that we would surely return home
and gives yet another date.
In the evening hours the dust-covered bus collects
the refugees
and sets out in the direction of
the detention camps.
______________
(From the city of Vavuniya – 16.02.2010)

THE HOMELESS CHILDREN SLEEPING IN THE GARDEN

A Poem in Tamil by Deebachelvan titled
POONGAAVIL URANGICH CHELGIRA VEEDATRA KUZHANDHAIGAL
Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan
__________________________
When their eyes are filled up with sleep
the children come to the garden
where entry is free for the kids.
The boy who has lost his hands
begs for an artificial limb
with the remaining bits and pieces.
He keeps wandering, carrying along
the dream for hands.
Converting into photographs his mangled face
and the fragment of his severed hands
He goes on asking for help
Everything remains deep in slumber
far away.
That boy, added to the loss of his hands,
has lost his smile too.

When the nine year old little girl
who has gone to School
is being gang-raped by
wild animals called army-men
these children are fast asleep
in the garden en route.
Text-books and note-books of children
are all blood-smeared and drenched.
These children eyeing the ice-fruit
are wishing with all their heart to have it.
With blood dripping non-stop
the fruits are being eaten away by Time.
They keep sharing among themselves
the whole lot of violations.

The world snatched away from the children
in a terrible scheme
of too great a magnitude
and sabotaged beyond repair
The world of children torn and thrown away
so thoroughly destroyed,
their dreams nipped and ripped apart
in an all too expensive plan
are being torn and thrown away gleefully
by the Monkeys
that keep telling tales in the garden incessantly.
When evening sets in
the homeless children
keep going back somewhere.

Throughout the day
the homeless children were playing
by my side.
With their Smiles and Hopes and Mercy
for the new world
they went on filling up
the applications.

And all those appeals
that the children were
writing and forwarding all through the day
have been thrown away in great haste
as part of the heap of garbage
into the disintegrated railway-lane.
Seeing the way blood seeping
out of the books brought by their off-springs
the Mothers begin to agonize.
The trees of the garden
where the children slept and left
are withering away and falling.
_______________________________

SHE HATES THE ROTI-SLICES

A Poem by Deebachelvan in Tamil titled
ROTTITH-THUNDUGALAI AVAL VERUKKIRAAL

Translated into English by latha ramakrishnan

________________________
She tells those kids holding ‘rotis’ to shun them.
Whenever they raise their food-bowel
‘rotis’ alone come to fall right in front of her eyes
The rotis rusted and frozen are smelling there always.

The whole night they had to be in the bunker
With the blood circulating dangerously
fast
“The children could have stayed behind
not wanting the rotis’’
_ So observes the mother.
None stepped outside.
In the very second steps of the bunker
the stove remained burning.
Writhing in hunger
The children were waiting for food.
Ma was preparing, one by one,
the rotis.
With the first roti roasted
One by one the children were getting their share.
Then, mother’s roti was getting roasted
On the tin-sheet.
All too easily the shell tore apart
The roti, tin and dad.
With father’s blood
the night had turned all drenched
and bloated.

In the ‘rotis’ of one and all
Blood came to spill over and scattered everywhere
The children listened to those tales about rotis and turned shell-shocked.
The children who have read
different tales in different forms
go on staring at them, not eating.
_________________________
(12.11.2009)

THE DAY WHEN I SET FOOT IN THE CITY SANS SHADE

A Poem by Deebachelvan in Tamil captioned
NIZHALATRA NAGARATHIL KAAL PADHITHA NAAL

Translated into English by Latha Ramakrishnan
___________________

In my city where flowers have ceased to be
just today I have set foot
In my city where I used to wander in
gay abandon
after the period of time
loaded with the sorrow of annihilations
I wander a little distance
I search for the things I had
Left behind
some people have returned
Collecting the ashes in their hands
They have returned

That night, for the second time
I had set foot in my city
I was all the while searching for the faces
The soil proved unsuitable for kissing
mixed as it were
with blood and flesh
The walls of my home-town
which have lost their beauty and luster-
I read as a lonely soul.

That the spirits of those sacrificed
hovering everywhere
writhing in anguish, hanging suspended
above the city
_so saying an old lady lies
beneath the wall
The city filled with darkness lay plunged in
nothingness.
The semi-trees and fragmented structures
would sprout again
_ The old lady keeps saying it aloud.

In city torn and ripped apart in curses
Wherever I tread the Earth caves in.
Slowly, inch by inch, I would retrieve my city
from the thorny barbed wire.
From the hands of decay and destruction
I would nourish it and make it prosper
step by step.
In the city of flowers dreams would bloom
My hope that everyone would return
in the coming days
I chanted in the well of night
when I left my City.
And, the City sans shade keeps counting
the footprints of me, the lone visitor.

_______________________

THE KING DENOUNCED BY THE DEFEATED PEOPLE

A poem in Tamil by DEEBACHELVAN titled
THOERKADIKKAPATTA MAKKALAAL NIRAAGARIKKAPPATTA ARASAN

Translated into English by latha ramakrishnan
_____________________
We had been defeated from Time Immemorial
The Great Grand Emperor defeating the
hapless people who had denounced him for his
deeds that smelt of foul Power
has ascended the throne.
It is from deceptions that he has won a Wholesome Form
The faces have been burnt for all times
Who have won
and who have lost -
The children begin to declare
Before all the kings
Before all the victories
Before the results too we have lost
Our Sky crashes down.

In the Seat made of many a deceit
The Great Grand Emperor sitting,
From the Time of Fear
Into the Emergency Period of
Terror and terrible suppression, annihilation
we are(un)settled in.
This too has settled as a cursed evening
Destroyed to the core
by Assurances, guarantees
exploited by Agreements and Treatises
and thus cheated as never before
In the bitter rivalry of Power
The very Life has been torn and thrown away.

For everything
we are going to kneel down before him
He who has devovoured voices
sings on our behalf
He who refuses to listen to words
would be strewing words all over tomorrow
He is going to smile again
He is going to curse us in our own-tongue.
The crops to sprout are lost forever
The fertile Time, he had fed upon.

The people are losing from the very beginning.
From thee fallen generation
There is not even a tiny gap of Time to do anything
with an iota of earnestness.
For our street and courtyard
We have to beg him.
For us to live on we have to
serve him in return.
At frist
We had met with a colossal defeat amidst ourselves
And, since then we have been losing out to them
steadily.

Directions, Moments, Words, Hearts,
Spaces, Holes
as separate entities
are being sacrificed.

Time is determined by him
In the Great Grand Emperor’s grazing ground
as meek goats
with no directions nor dwelling sheds
We keep wandering
Blocking the words he has tied the mouth shut
Today someone has won
someone has lost
Losing Time forever, children are being deceived
day in and day out
Defeat pursues us from time immemorial…
__________________