Night for night

Night, is both thick and thin. The thick hangs at a distance, dotted by stars and a crescent shaped moon. The thick also looms below in the form of squalour, lit by incandescent lights, almost a reflection of what’s above. The two layers are separated by the thin, at the horizon. 

The thin bears a lightness of its own from being not just a separator, but an entity that reminds us of how light punctuates the dark. That’s the interpretation drawn by Nabina Sunuwar for the cover of Night, an anthology of poems by Sulochana, translated by Muna Gurung.

The cover and the title represent what the 32 poems in the books bring us — an array of verses that are written from the pit of the night, flitting between longing, love and loss. While the original collection consisted of sixty poems, this chap-book version published by Safu has selected pieces, some of them Sulochan’s favourite and some Muna Gurung's, presented in Nepali as well as in their translated forms in the book.

The first poem in the book already sets the reader free:

Softly, night arrives

Gives me wings, and leaves

I become free

I wear them 

out into a world

I’ve created

wandering any which way 

Read also: Toya Gurung: Nepali literature's Thulnani, Muna Gurung

For, night is just that — a way to grow wings that let you hover from dream to dream. While Sulochana writes from the place of being a woman, her poems do not confine to the boundaries of the household, a theme constantly explored by some of her contemporaries. The expressions are fluid and so allow for readers of different backgrounds to find something in the poetry that will speak to them. 

Unlike ‘day’ that is claimed in fragments by others around us, the night is wholesome, belonging to the one who takes comfort from its darkness:

My night is without a deed,

it cannot be given to another

it is the land in which I feel free

it is the land I can call my own

Read also: Maya Thakuri: Writing between the lines, Muna Gurung

As the book provides both the Nepali and the English versions, the reader is likely to look up both versions together. What will surprise you while doing so, is how the translated versions carry the same expressions, while becoming poems of their own. And to borrow Muna Gurung’s words: ‘As in any translation, I’ve struggled with the question of ‘accuracy’ for the project. Should I stay close to the source of language and the poem's forms, or should I move freely but stay true to the emotional heart of the poems as they travel from one language to another?’ 

The poems that they have become in translation are like snatches of thoughts caught, and held to be relished in more than one language, surpassing the challenges of translation.

Translating poems is not easy to do because with poems, it is not enough to make sure every sentence is carried forth accurately, it has to also carry the tone and the mood. When reading Night, what comes across clearly is the collaboration between the original writer and the translator — the understanding of the poems as a collective expression and work of dedication and friendship between two women. 

Read also: Young Nepali poets in search of poetic license, Pratibha Tuladhar and Sahina Shrestha

Some of the poems carry different titles from the original and some words have been changed to maintain authenticity to the English language. For Newa words, while their meaning is lent in repetition in the first instance (chatamari bread), they appear in their own right in the second reference (Silently, I watch/the chatamari slowly/disappear).

To Sulochana, night is many things, many sentiments, many thoughts. But night, is also mother. So, while night becomes the personification of a mother who allows the poet to fall asleep in the warmth of her lap, night, is also freedom in the form of a black canvas on which one is free to draw any shape. 

Night, is also a friend, but also the one who seeks friendship with the offering of its dark, quiet stretch. Night is a picture, a journey, a country, a conversation, but also pain and disorder. 

Some of the poems in the book are half a sentence, spoken in one breath — the perfect thing to read aloud to yourself on a sleepless night. Or repeat sometimes like a chant, just like we do with our thoughts on sleepless nights. While there is some anxiety trailing at the heels of the thoughts that cloud the darkness, there’s also the assurance that if one is to receive the night as a gift, as an extension of the day, then it’s possible to silently watch it ‘meld into the soft light of dawn’. 

Read also: Bina Theeng Tamang: More than a maichyang, Muna Gurung

Then night becomes something you could not cling to, even if you so desire, but only watch as it leaves with the promise of return, like a lover who leaves you in torment as much as the fulfillment of having been with you.

While the persona of most of the poems is speaking to the night and about the night, in some of the poems, it is the night who becomes the dominant voice, even without speaking: ‘I will become night/ and wait/Just to watch her at play’. 

The beauty of poetry lies in how they speak to the reader. While in the day of Instagram poetry, a lot of criticism has been hurled at IG poets who have shot to popularity with their succinct verses that appease the masses, it is also true that some readers of poetry seek to understand the poetry they are reading. 

That lightness of comprehension is what Sulochana’s poems carry in their original form. They are poems we all want to read because they bear a familiarity that comes from simplicity. And Muna Gurung deftly interprets them in English, giving us a set of poems that makes the reader feel like these lines could be their own.

(Night will be released on 21 August, 2021. For launch and related events, follow @kathasatha and @qcbookshop on Instagram and Facebook.)