Poesia kaiera
Aitaren heriotza
Faltsuek baino ez zuten malkorik isuri
nire aita hil zenean, argazkian gorpuarekin
agertzera etorri ziren haiek; aita baitzen
Calicuten hil zen gizonik inportanteena
Vascok Kappadeko harea zapaldu zuenetik.
Jendea errepideen bi aldeetan zegoen ingurura
begira, garaiz prestaturik hil karro lorez apaindua
pasatzen ikusteko, eta batuta distiratsuz hornitu
poliziek zuzentzen zuten trafikoaren orkestra.
Gizonei bakarrik utzi zieten ahukura batzen.
Gu atzean geratu ginen, amaren ondoan eserita,
zeina negar egiteko ere nekatuegi baitzegoen.
Orduan gure etxeak jenderik gabe geratutako antzoki bat
zirudien, girgil zatitxoak eta petaloak barreiu atarian.
Hamabi egun eta gauez egin genion beila, begiak tinko
haren aurpegi itxian, zeina trebeki itxuratu baitzuen
oinazez sartu zenean komaren behe laino trinkoan.
Hariei lotutako txotxongilo bat zirudien.
Gomazko hodi meheak zerizkion nola tuberkuluak
zulo guztietatik, eta piztia arraro bat zuen uluka
bular barrenetik, minez bezala. Amak negar zotinka
esan zuen: beldurtzen nauena ez da heriotza, ezpada hau,
oi Jainkoa; ezin dut jasan behin eta berriz entzutea…
Hileroko eskupekoa galdu zutenek baino
ez zuten negar egin nire aita hil zenean.
Eskuzabala zen bere diruarekin,
ni maitasunarekin bezain eskuzabala.
Tentsio laino bat zegoen gure artean.
Diotenez, lotsarazten nuen. Bisitan etorri zitzaidan
aldiro, banana krispetak eta gaitzespen hitzak
ekartzen zizkidan. Beldurra nion aitari.
Koma hartan soilik zirudien nigandik hurbil,
eta belarrian xuxurlatu nion maite nuela,
nahiz eta alaba txarra, emazte txarra eta ama txarra izan;
baina maitatzeko lantegian txarrak ziren trebeenak.
Besarkatu egin behar ninduzun, aita, behin bederen;
hitz atseginak esan, urtean behin bederen.
Nire semeei ehun errupiako billeteak eman zenizkien;
erosi egin zenuen haien debozioa; baina nire prezioa
altuegia zen zuretzat; zure poltsan ez zen kabitzen
diru abstrakturik. Familia loturez ele-mele aritzeak
ez ditu sendoago egiten; badakizu hainbeste, aita…
My Father’s Death
Only the insincere shed tears / At my father’s death, those who came / To get photographed with the corpse, / He was the most important man to die / In Calicut since Vasco trod the sands at Kappad. / Looking around on both sides of roads / The people stood, pre-arranged, to watch / The flower-bedecked hearse pass, / And the police with polished batons directed the traffic’s orchestra. / Only the men were allowed to join the convoy, / We stayed behind and sat near Mother / Who was too fatigued even to weep. / Our house seemed then like a theatre, deserted, / Bits of tinsel and petals littered up the porch. / For twelve days and nights we had kept a vigil, / Gazing into his shut face he had shrewdly traded / In his pain for a coma that was thick like a fog, / He was like a puppet attached to its strings. / Thin rubber tubes grew like tubers / From every orifice and a strange beast howled / From within his chest as though in pain. / Mother said with a sob, it’s not his death that I fear but this, / Oh God, I cannot bear to hear it again and again... // Only those who lost their monthly Baksheesh / Wept at my father’s death, / He was generous with his money, / As generous as I was with love. / There was a cloud of tension between us. / I brought him shame, they say. He brought me on each / Visit banana chips and words of reproach. / I feared my father. / Only in that coma did he seem close to me, / And I whispered into his ears that I loved him, / Although a bad daughter, bad wife and bad mother, but in the task / of loving the bad ones were the ablest. / You should have hugged me, father, just once, / You should have used kind words just once a year. / You gave my sons hundred rupee notes, / You purchased their devotion but my price was too high / For you, your wallet could not hold / Abstract currency. Talking and talking / Of family bonds will not grow them, you know, father...