Donkeystone

We're working in a Hindu temple in Oldham as part of our Making Memories project with Gallery Oldham, funded by the Barings Foundation. This poem by Hansa delicately explores the relationship between objects and memory.

What has been fascinating about this newest phase of our project is the shift between cultures that simply walking into the temple necessitates. There are of course lots of discussions about hopping between languages, from English to Gujarati, to Sanskrit and so on. But also we're constantly moving between times, from past to now and back. 

The translation I'd like to offer in order to understand the following poem is nothing to do with East/West language shifts, but a now unused word from Northern England - the Donkeystone. This was a stone used to scrub clean people's front steps; it was acquired from the Rag and Bone Man in exchange for unwanted clothes, which he took away for recycling on his horse and cart. And now read on...

Donkeystone

Airport: my father picked us up

coming into the UK, I was 15

it was a Sunday, dull and damp

my story is like many other people's:

while the sitting lion lazes, not moving

the deer will not get into his mouth.

Father had to work Monday

late that morning we heard

someone outside yelling

a horse and cart man shouting

clothes hanging from his cart.

(we thought he was going to wash them) calling...

Mum had led an easy life in India

people to do cleaning, chores

she said: 'Dhobi man is here

come on let's get the washing done.

Quick!' All the laundry in a big bag, new clothes

made to measure for our new life in England.

By the time we got it in the bag

he was gone. That night mum told

dad, 'No washing, Dhobi was gone.'

Dad was a magistrate, spoke the mother tongue

Gujurati, Hindi, Sanskrit

perfect English. He said:

'That was a bogeyman, not a dhobi man, a

Rag and Bone Man!

Good job he didn't take our clothes

all you would've got from him was

a donkeystone

to clean your steps.'

A lotus is one of the gods' symbols

a lotus flower

grows in the mud of the mind

but stays clean; in this world

we must live like a lotus, says

Sanskrit, morals, scripture.

School, India, before coming here

learnt Gujarati, Hindi, English

(one lesson a day only, one hour),

Sanskrit – four languages by memory -

learning sloks, the short poems

Sanskrit the ancient language; dying

language of priest, temple, holy book

the one I remember from when

I was 11 years old, still memorised:

to gain your goal you must work hard

while the sitting lion lazes, not moving

the deer will not get into his mouth.

We worked hard.

Hansa

12 Sept 2013