cart driver

Cart Driver
By : Padma Sachdev

Introduction Of The Poet :

Padma Sachdev (1940) is a prominant Dogri poet and short story writer.Her writings have given a new face lift to Dogri Literature .She has been widely read and acknowledged in the literary circles.Her poetry is intensely emotional .she was awarded Sahitiya Academy Award in 1971 for her collection of poems Meri Kavita, Meray Geet.

Poem

In the fearful silence of the forest
I hear

The sound of the footfalls

Of a careful bulbul

Out in the night shaking the feathers on his head

To find food for its four little ones

Hungry in the next

Moving slowly, afraid,

its ears pricked to pick

some sound somewhere

with the grain in its beak

it hastens to the nesti

ts twittering fledgelings do not know

the forest is in the throes of fear

they continue chirping.

The bulbul trembles

Moves with his head raised

Alert, all ears.

Suddenly there is a sound of wheels

The sound of dry leaves crackling

The sound rising and subsiding

The bulbul hides itself in the bushes

.It seesA bullock cart laden with good

Bullocks moving by themselves

Heads downThe driver asleep, snoring

Eyes covered with the head of his turban

What if the cart stumbles

The cart drivers’ hookah overturns’

The forest catches fire’

It imagines the forest on fire

Wishes to run towards its nest

To save its young ones

But cannot lift its legs

Out of fear

(Translated from the Dogri by Dr Karan Singh)