Enemy

I have an enemy
Who hates me as if I were dirt
But I like him as if he were a flower.

He wants the sun
Not to shine in my face,
Wants the spring
Not to come and settle in my garden.
He wants the air
Not to enter
The windows and doors of my house,
Wants the flowers in my yards
Not to smell fragrant.

He wants my kids
Not to shriek laud and be heard by him.
He wants them not to have funs
In a way hurtful to him.
He sits on the veranda of his house
And quietly wants any passers -by
Seen at a distance,
Not to enter my home,
Wants anyone with presents or gifts
Not to knock at my door,
Wants old folks returning from the temples
To avoid sitting
In the tree - shade just In front of my house.

He does not like the bird
Perched on my house - top.
He does not like to see the moon
Hang above my roof,
Does not like the green in my farm
To bear me much luck,
Does not like my hopes blossoming
In the mango - orchard,
Does not like the canal-water
To soak the throat of my drying soil,
He dislikes anything, anything that I like.

Why doesn't the rainwater
Wash down my roof?
Why can't the flood,
On the other side of the village,
Come swelling along the road to my house?
Why is this lazy fire so quietly
Slumbering in the fireplace?
Why don't the sparks fly up
Just like the fireflies? Why don't they burn
Something that belongs to me?

He wants a desert to enter my dream,
Wants the storm to come
And hide inside my house,
Wants to see thieves in the dark
Lurk behind my walls,
Wants my smiles to fall off my lips
And disappear in the sand.
But I like him as if he were a flower.

In this huge world
There's no one except him,
No one among my kiths & kins,
Not anyone big or small,
Not one familiar or unfamiliar,
Who, forgetting his own desires & dreams,
Forgetting the rain and the sun,
Flower, birds & the moon,
Home, the earth & the sky,
Would bother to think so much about me,
Would bother to remember me incessantly.

Oh! living without a foe is
Living without a part of life
That constantly faces your way
And keeps giving you so much joy.
I like him as if he were a flower.
 

- Translated from Nepali by the poet.
©Manu Manjil 2006