'Ganer Gunto'

         When summer comes, we hear the hums
         Bhisma Lochan Sharma.
         You catch his strain on hill and plain from Delhi
         down to Burma
         He sings as though he's staked his life, he sings
         as though he's hell-bent;
         The people, dazed, retire amazed although they
         know it's well-meant.
         They're trampled in the panic rout or languish
         pale and sickly,
         And plead, "My friend, we're near our end, oh
         stop your singing quickly!"
         The bullock-carts are overturned, and horses
         line the roadside;
         But Bhisma Lochan, unconcerned, goes
         booming out his broadside.
         The wretched brutes resent the blare the hour
         they hear it sounded,
         They whine and stare with feet in air or wonder
         quite confounded.
         The fishes dived below the lake in frantic search
         for silence,
         The very trees collapse and shake - you hear the
         crash a mile hence -
         And in the sky the feathered fly turn turtle while
         they're winging,
         Again we cry,"We're going to die, oh won't you
         stop your singing?"
         But Bhisma's soared beyond our reach, howe'er
         we plead and grumble;
         The welkin weeps to hear his screech, and mighty
         mansions tumble.
         But now there comes a billy goat, a most
         sagacious fellow,
         He downs his horns and charges straight, with
         bellow answ'ring bellow.
         The strains of song are tossed and whirled by
         blast of brutal violence,
         And Bhisma Lochan grants the world the golden
         gift of silence.
                         
                        - Sukumar Ray, trans. by Sukanta Chaudhury