All is One Here
The things you always said
Seemed different
The thoughts that crossed your mind
Seemed scattered
But
The place where we stand now
All is one here
Like water
Like air
And
Like the radiant sun
The green wilderness
The limitless sky
They are all
One and the same.
In these parts
The odour of sweat
The taste of tears
Are all the same
And that’s not all
The colour of blood
The mind
The heart
Is enough for love to thrive.
The jaat you carried
The religion you sought
The nationality you lived out
The wealth you witnessed
The power you enjoyed
The party you voted for
Do not divide
All is one here
For
Does despair have a jaat?
Suffering, a religion?
Weariness, a nation?
What is the worth of death?
The colour of want?
The taste of hunger?
And
Which party should the poor launch?
So
For us
All is one here
All is the same
One and the same.
Darjeeling Blues
Every day –
A troop of men
carrying guns
Are marching to surrender their weapons
through the Chowk Bazaar
Of the eighties
Colourful jerry cans
that used to line up in Laal Dhigi daily
And ancient Gorkhey Jeeps
Have long melted
Into the crowd of Mohabbat Galli
Up there–
On Mahakal Daara
endless prayers are whispered
Every morning and evening
For sons
to be enrolled in the army
For daughters
working in parlours and spas
to be safe
Mothers –
unable to secure a place for tomorrow
are shouting for their rights
In processions
That bear no fruit
Brothers –
looking for a place
For mothers to sell vegetables
Carrying slingshots
Maney, too, has gone
With a slingshot and a few rotis in his pocket
Maney hasn’t made it back
He wasn’t allowed to
The porter didi of the Railway Station
Casts her namlo aside
Keeps listening to news from the border
Keeps wondering
Whether her son is safe
Darjeeling—
The land of ancient dreams
Darjeeling, a bazaar of promises
Where even the railway
Harbours dreams
The land rovers, senior citizens now
Write poetry too
They know the songs of the hills by heart
Verses that carry love for the land
The struggle for identity
They sing them
Over and over again
Even if no one listens
Darjeeling—
Is benevolent
Darjeeling is patriotic
Keeps sacrificing beating hearts
On the altar of the nation
Surrendering dreams
And so
Even the nation
keeps Darjeeling close
The nation
keeps sending Darjeeling
Its hearts
Wrapped with love in the national flag
From the border
Day after day
Kanchenjunga unpacks
Bundles of hearts turned cold
Sent back by the nation
Kanchenjunga
Is helpless, stupefied
Kanchenjunga—
Keeps on gazing vacantly
Into the distance
On Love
I have come to be
Sand
In an hourglass
You make up
The other half
Slowly
I melt into you
Pouring myself out
Emptied
At last
I become you.
Prabin Khaling is a writer, poet, journalist, and activist from Sikkim, India, known for his contributions to literature, environmental advocacy, and inclusive writing in Nepali literature. His literary works include Jhari (2015), an anthology of love poems and Chiya Guff (2023), a collection of essays on socio-cultural and environmental issues. He is the founder of “Chiya Kavita”, an informal literary initiative in Sikkim that connects tea culture with poetry.
Translators
Saswati Saha is an Assistant Professor at the Department of English, Sikkim University, India. In 2019, she was awarded Charles Wallace India Trust Research Grant for short term research at the British Library in the UK. She has been awarded full Residential Bursary by British Centre for Literary Translation to attend the Summer School, 2023 held in the University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK. She translates from Bengali, Nepali and Hindi into English.
Abrona Lee Pandi Aden is an Assistant Professor at the Department of English, Sikkim University, India. Her short stories and poems have appeared in Muse India, Mekong Review, Sapiens Anthropology Magazine, The Bangalore Review, among others. She translates from Nepali to English. She is a recipient of the ICM Global South Translation Fellowship awarded by the Institute of Comparative Modernities, Cornell University, in 2022. She has been the Charles Wallace India Trust Creative Writing Fellow at the University of Kent, Canterbury, UK during their Spring Term, 2024.
