Wednesday, March 12, 2008

The Child Wonders

The child looks with wonder
at the painting of the burning flame.
His fingers tingle with excitement.
His fingers are itching
to touch the bright flame.
He carefully reaches out to touch
then hesitantly pulls back
and looks at his mother.

He doesn't understand
how the flame burns
without destroying the painting.
He doesn't understand
how the flame came to life
without burning the painter's fingers.
How did it learn
to stand gracefully,
to burn without destroying.
The wonder tingles
the child's fingers.

5 comments:

Pro Wrestling Fan said...

Nice. Is this your own poem or did you translate someone else's poem?

Chenthil said...

Krishnan - this is a translation. The original was written by Sundara Ramasamy, will post that in a couple of days. Wanted to test how the translation works as a stand alone poem.

Anonymous said...

very evocative..cant wait for the untranslated version

Shakti RC said...

Interesting blog you've got here. Lovely poem (and translation) too - a wonderful example of how "in simplicity lies some of the greatest truths"...(purely a personal opinion, of course) :).

Thanks for posts such as this - it's a great outlet for non-Thamizh-educated-yet-highly-Thamizh-inclined Indians like myself to be in touch with the language, and its beauty...:)

Anonymous said...

You seem to have a flair for translation