The Hijol* Tree’s Shade Poem by Kushal Dutta

Her fault was she had been to the river to look at herself
The god of the river took her down to the water and that’s that

The one who jumped in to bring her from the water
Had a boat of ejar* wood and his calves too were ejar-hued

Leaving boat and oar meandering under water
The light house of truth glimmered in the distance easy as a straight line

Exhausted swimming as they got out of water on to land
Under the shade of the hijol by the river they looked at their eyes

The colour of breath under water was green on land it’s like land
The shade of the hijol hides all unwritten annals of the earth
***
* The Indian oak, Barringtonia acutangula.
* A species of timber tree, Lagerstroemia reginae.
(Translated from Assamese by Prof. Pradip Acharya)