Monday 15 July 2013

SHE WOLF

By Lhachap Jinpa 
Translated from Tibetan by Bhuchung D. Sonam


Pursuing the realm of the realized ones
Across the chain of rocky hills
Where the soul of my she-wolf is said to roam
Letting her livid mind ride the yellow black storm

The terror of the earth and sky cuts across her shawl
Her cries vibrate like sounds of battles raging
Failing to avoid the rage of angry demons
The wolf clings to the dead of the Ten-million Burial Ground

Multiple-thinking head collide with rocks
The sound of collision spreads across the world
And the hopes of bad times strike the she-wolf
Like thousand promises made of the time

Sounds of the sages’ thigh-bone horn lingers
Lighting a thousand lamps of the soul
Quietly shedding the secrets of the truth
My she-wolf abodes in the celestial-realm


Months and years pass by at a click of fingers
Whereas the soul of the wolf remains in the world
Pure and clean like a mind of a one-year-old child
Constantly busy fulfilling various worldly deeds

Once I heard the cry of the she-wolf
Pulling my heart and mind towards her
To enjoy a feast that I did not earn
And today this body pains and aches

In this tightly bewitched world of mine
I once read the she-wolf’s story
And like the boundless joy of freedom
It gave waves of heart-warming bliss

Gods have hurled stones into the abodes of demigods
Irate demigods send rains of rocks in return
In between this battle of gods and demigods
My she-wolf flourish gracefully in peace

Madly laughing hordes of demons
Swim in a sea of reddish black blood
This heart-shaking terrifying enemy of demons
Conquered me and my she-wolf in this century

I failed to recognize the battles in the right
Nor did I toll the compassion bells on the left
From this end of the world that belongs to me
I build this live-image of thoughts from my mind


Note: Lhachap Jinpa is one of the foremost Tibetan poet in exile. He was born in Amdo and came into exile. He told me that he wrote this very cryptic poem decades ago in Tibet. 'I wrote this as it came to me' he said sitting in his tiny one-room quarters at Gu-Chu-Sum Movement of Tibet, a Dharamsala-based Tibetan former political prisoners association.

As a reader if you can make sense of what this poem could mean or means to you, please share your thoughts. Thanks