भीगी बिल्ली

(Translated and adapted from a Pahari (Himachali) folk song) On a warm sunny day I hate work in the bow’ry And say, O father mine Do give away my dowry.

One day, a summer day, after years, after I had crossed my teens and sought my degree, I was trekking. I was tracing back to my village to trace my half-forgotten race. I met a grey bearded man, old of age on my way to my village space, to accompany me. He started to sing [...]

One fine morning, I happened to pass through a jungle with my father. I was deep in thought at one with the music of silence when I heard a bird sing. Did she sing or did she wail? Dhiya Dudhu Pii! Dhiya Dudhu Pii! She refrained as if she had missed the cues of her [...]

He fickled up and down As the moon did shy For fort time, not of nature But of his ego ‘I’ *** He had forsaken his cosy home for the desolate of the wild. But soon had yielded to the forces of nature and yearned for the break of morn, so as to go back [...]