A Burnt-Out Aircraft at Dusk

                                                         by  Shailendra Shail


Undefeated
    Hidden in the thicket of trees

    the aircraft looked

    like a dark giant at dusk.

    It was not an aircraft, infact

    but mere ribs of it

    left after the crash –

    bare, hostile and scary

    like a wounded vulture.


    He knew

    nobody had been there for years;

    penetrating the shoulder-high wild grass

    he went on.


    He is quite a timid fellow

    but a bizarre curiosity

    had drawn him there;

    with his head lowered

    he entered the portion

    which must have been once the cockpit –

    here sat the pilot

    here co-pilot

    and here navigator :

    the navigator

    under whose burnt-out seat

    was a bird-nest –

    three chicks

    trying to open their eyes;

    the navigator had just got married.


    Then he came to the cargo-chamber –

    fifty paratroopers

    how gracefully they used to

    d

    e

    s

    c

    e

    n

    d

    gradually :

    fifty mushrooms

    growing gradually;

    here stood Naik Ram Singh

    here Hawaldar Aslam

    ready to float in the air.


    On the half-burnt wing

    had shot up a tree –

    looked from the distance like the English neem;

    the leaf was not bitter.

    He thought

    he would send a leaf to Salim Ali

    and ask the tree’s name –

    then he realized

    Salim Ali was an expert on birds

    not trees.


    He was just through all this

    when his foot struck something hard.

    He bent :

    an army water bottle

    as it is

    despite a burnt-out outer felt.

    He brought it home

    as a memento.


    On the way he thought

    displaying it on a fine stand

    he would impress his friends;

    and tell him about the navigator

    who had just got married

    and the chicks

    who under his burnt-out seat

    were trying to open

                                    their eyes.



    Translated from the Hindi by Samartha Vashishtha



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