Men And Fish Poem by Prayag Saikia

The tumult of the sun rose
The little boys of the sunlit morn
Jumped into the river one by one
Someone from the bridge
Someone from the quay
Someone from the boat
Swimming gaily they tagged on to the river
Men and fish

They raised a tumult in the mermaids' haunted quay
The river would calm down
Only when they grow weary
Men and fish
Never frolic in the water all the time
They shall come out of hunger
of exhaustion
in quest of wisdom
However he might wish for life-long
Man can never be fish
Man has his home on the laps of the earth
In the summer morn the little boys attaining teenage
Turn into fish for a short while
Swimming gaily raise tumults
In the mermaids' quay
Only when mishaps occur at times
Do the fish of the minds stay shrunk
Even in the summer frolicsome morns
The river remains oddly calm

(Translated from Original Assamese by Krishna Dulal Barua)