Border Line

Surely                                                                                  

A crime it is

Co-existing

Unseen lines drawn

On each step

On each look

A crime it is

Living together too.

A life started

Afresh, unaware

Stands like a question

A mark between

Indelible lines.

Those houses

Are of  pa, are of Allah

These houses

Are of ma, are of their Gods

Says five year old Sahir.

Starts life once more

The same question.

So sad, even this tiny tot’s

Life can’t shake the taut structure.

Two clashing border lines

The houses of those of ma’

The houses of these of pa’

Border lines of two faiths

Between his sport and play

Marking his moves and movements

His conduct and character

-2-

Love  is no crime

Keeping  a Bindi on

Or wiping it off at the outskirts

No crime.

Mere habits

Simple markers

Mere features

Both

‘Saraswati Namasthubhyam’

‘Allaho Akbar’.

Yet,

Travel you must great distances

Between tow conjugal configurations

Against tow provocative names

Fignting the forbidding roots.

Yet,

We remain-

She a temple,

Me a Masjid.

 

Then,

Which synagogue hanging mid air

Should we together

Fix as a token

For our tiny tot?

-3-

Philosophers too wouldn’t predict

If we can ever reach a stage sans religion

Even atheists wouldn’t give up

Bangles, Hindi or Saffronisms
Nor do rationalists and Kafirs

                                      Their totems.

May be religion too like

Blood has crept up the body?

-4-

Borderline between body and body politic

Between body and religion

Between body and human bond

Between body and passion

A border line

                     en 

                                 tren

                                              ching !

[Translated from Telugu by Vangunta Mohan Prasad from the volume sarihaddu Rekha 2002

 poem titled ‘Sarihaddu Rekha’  (P.27) ]