Beyond Land and Time

She

(Shε)

Translated by Joe Winter

She called me to her and said

‘The river-water

is your eyes’ faded cane-berry colour;

from weariness, from blood,

it soothes the ground around, makes new;

the river here is you.’

‘Might it be Dhanshiri?’

I asked the kingfisher.

The river had been given its name by her.

I seek the deep girl now: but she

adrift on water’s endless stair

is out somewhere.

An aeon ago within

an endless interleaf of white and black—from Time’s interior,

in love with fish and soul and kingfisher,

a woman appearing . . . if she had not been

a 24-carat-city-girl, in love with the bright lights, she—

she would have been the Dhanshiri.