My Aunt, the Witch

Basudev Sunani

Translator - Sailen Routray

Blue-tailed Bee-eater in Bundala National Park, Sri Lanka
Photo Credit - A Savin (Wikimedia Commons)

From the day the sons 

of the house of Bemal

had chased Dahanikaki

at midnight,

I breathe a little hard

every time I see her.

 

This weepy, affectionate woman,

coating the floor with cow dung,

picking up dried dung cakes,

playing with her naked granddaughter,

is apparently,

a witch?

 

Her walk raises the dead

and her eyes can freeze

a running doe;

but at times those eyes

glaze over with mist,

And make me exclaim.

Praise the lord

who created such a wonder!

 

Once the village deity himself had come,

riding the body of the medium.

He got slapped by my aunt

and left in a hurry.

People asked that

if she were not a witch,

then how would she have survived,

having slapped the lord?

 

People also say that she was seen

on a new moon night,

walking on her hands,

and feasting on shit

in the village common field.

 

But in the village panchayat,

it was difficult to prove anything

with a fragment of a torn Sari;

she had a narrow escape.

 

Rumours have it that

she cast an evil eye 

on Bidhu Babu’s boy,

who then died

after suffering from fever

for a couple of years;

it was also rumoured that

she did the same thing

to Sania’s mother’s youngest daughter

on her way 

to the bathing ghat on the river.

It so happens

that her periods stopped,

and her breasts shriveled.

While returning home,

whenever I pass by 

the fig tree near her house,

she always asks with extra affection,

“How are your two bull-like sons?

They are yet to turn five,

but so naughty!

Why did you not get them here?

you must,”

with just the hint of a smile.

Translator's Note: Basudev Sunani (b. 1962) is one of the foremost poetic voices of his generation in Odia literature. He also has a body of prose in the form of novels, academic monographs and essays in the language.  This English translation was first published in the year 2013  in the Kendriya Sahitya Akademi periodical Indian Literature in its 277th issue. It is a version of the original Odia poem published in the collection 'Karadi Hata' in 2005.