This Number Does Not Exist

By Mangalesh Dabral

This is a Bilingual English/Hindi edition.

This Number Does Not Exist is the first English translation and U.S. publication of Mangalesh Dabral. He has been translated widely in other languages, including all major Indian languages and Russian, German, Dutch, Spanish, French, Polish, and Bulgarian.

Dabral is well-known abroad: he has given readings in such countries as the U.S. (International Writing Program, University of Iowa), Russia, Bulgaria, Nepal, Mauritius, and Japan, and many of his poems in translation have found their way into various foreign anthologies.

Mangalesh Dabral is not only a poet, but has also been a journalist and editor for several decades. He has also translated such writers as Bertolt Brecht, Pablo Neruda, Yannis Ritsos, and Herman Hesse from English into Hindi.

According to Poetry International, "the foothills of the Himalayas formed the backdrop of Dabral's youth. In many of his poems you can still feel the fresh Himalayan breeze and see the observing consciousness of the boy who has come from the village to the big city. Although now a praised and acknowledged poet, Mangalesh’s tone is still unassuming. Although critical as well: Is the world good enough for our children? Is human contact becoming reduced to impersonal communications via cell phones?"

• Language: English
• Publisher: BOA Editions Ltd.
• Release date: Jun 20, 2016
• ISBN: 9781942683131

Book preview

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This Number Does Not Exist

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Hindi text copyright © 2016 by Mangalesh Dabral

English language copyright © 2016 by the respective translators

All rights reserved

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition

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Publications by BOA Editions, Ltd.—a not-for-profit corporation under section 501 (c) (3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code—are made possible with funds from a variety of sources, including public funds from the Literature Program of the National Endowment for the Arts; the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency; and the County of Monroe, NY. Private funding sources include the Lannan Foundation for support of the Lannan Translations Selection Series; the Max and Marian Farash Charitable Foundation; the Mary S. Mulligan Charitable Trust; the Rochester Area Community Foundation; the Steeple-Jack Fund; the Ames-Amzalak Memorial Trust in memory of Henry Ames, Semon Amzalak, and Dan Amzalak; and contributions from many individuals nationwide.

Cover Design: Sandy Knight

Cover Art: Cover 3 by Patricia Buckley

Interior Design and Composition: Richard Foerster

Manufacturing: Versa Press, Inc.

BOA Logo: Mirko

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Dabral, Mangalesh, 1948– author.

Title: This number does not exist : poems / by Mangalesh Dabral.

Description: First edition. | Rochester, NY : BOA Editions Ltd., 2016. | Series: Lannan Translations Selection Series

Identifiers: LCCN 2016002301 (print) | LCCN 2016008556 (ebook) | ISBN 9781942683124 (paperback) | ISBN 9781942683131 (E-book)

Subjects: | BISAC: POETRY / Asian. | FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDY / Hindi. | SOCIAL SCIENCE / Social Classes. | SOCIAL SCIENCE / Developing Countries.

Classification: LCC PK2098.19.A25 A2 2016 (print) | LCC PK2098.19.A25 (ebook)

  | DDC 891.4/317—dc23

LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016002301

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for dearest daughter Alma

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Author’s Note

Good for a Lifetime

The Quiet House

The Death of Leaves

Words

Woman in Love

Outside

Grandfather’s Photograph

Letter to Children

Poem of Dreams

Poem of Paper

The Sounds

In Passing

City

The Other Hand

Daily Grind

We

Delhi: 2

Lantern on Mountain

Exhaustion

A Child

Final Incident

Return

The Seven-Day Journey

A Poem on Childhood

This Is Where the River Was

Inside You

Absence

Love

The Room

Skin

These Times

Delhi: 1

The Places That Are Left

I Wish

Kiss

New Orleans Jazz

The Accompanist

A Picture of Father

A Picture of Mother

A Picture of Myself

Gunanand Pathik

Tale of Two Poets

The Way Home

Before Going to Sleep

Touch

This Number Does Not Exist

The Missing

Song of the Dislocated

This Winter

Old Photographs

My Way

Torchlight

A Dream

An Act

My Face

Civilization

A Picture

Asking for Favors

The City, Again

Enemy in the New Era

The New Bank

One of Gujarat’s Dead Speaks

Reality These Days

Acknowledgments

About the Author

About the Translators

Author’s Note

Making a selection from one’s own poems is a perplexing task. One of the reasons for this is that if a poem is good or pertinent then it parts company with its creator and starts living a life of its own no matter how long or short it may be. As for bad poems, they are as good as ash. In my language there are poems that are so independent in disposition that we can treasure them even without bringing their authors to mind. For instance, Saroj-smriti (Saroj: In Memoriam) and Wah Todati Patthar (A Woman Breaking Stones) are the great poet Nirala’s compositions, but they lead an independent cultural and readerly life after breaking free from the poet’s titular rights. Not all poems are fortunate enough to attain such significance, but what holds true for all poems is that, with the passage of time, the poet cannot have such authority on them as he or she had at the time of writing them, and the attempt to make them the poet’s private property again seems like a trespass.

About forty-five years ago, when I came to Delhi with a few poems, mine was a migration from a serene, hemmed-in place endowed by nature to a sprawling and predatory world abuzz with