# The Daughter of Fire and Other Poems

- Link: https://writersworkshopindia.com/2015/07/09/the-daughter-of-fire-and-other-poems/
- Published: 2015-07-09T19:22:21+00:00
- Author: admin

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**Author:** Sukanya Maruthi
 **Pages:** 66 **Year of Publication:** 2010 **Price:**
HB Rs 150, FB Rs 100 **ISBN:** HB FB

_**About the Author**_
 Sukanya Maruthi is a Kannada poet with five collections 
of poetry to her credit. Besides English, her poems have been translated into Hindi,
Marathi, Telugu and Malayalam. English translations of her poems have been brought
out in journals like the _Journal of Literature and Aesthetics_ and _Pratibha India_.
She teaches Kannada in a local college in Dharwad and is involved in several social
movements, particularly those concerning Dalits and women.

_**Teaser**_

_Then and Now_

When my husband
 Was still my friend and playmate, I, his wife Was then only a girl.

Be it in games or in lessons,
 I hadn’t fallen behind him Anytime. Just once, while
running, My long skirt got stuck to my legs And I fell. The dhoti he wore caused
no problem to him And he won. I, who fell on that day, Haven’t got up till today.

I was, then,
 Grime and dirt all over my body, Hurt, sad, and defeated, The ‘playmate’
who had deemed me then ‘untouchable’ And had kept me at a distance, Now, has become
my ‘husband’.

I, who was a ‘girl’
 That hadn’t fallen behind him, then, Am now a ‘wife’ for having
fallen. All that I had learnt in the school I am using now To count the number of
wooden beams in the kitchen.

I spend my time now
 Nourishing what he sows, And searching for ‘myself’ Lost somewhere
within me.

[Translated by Dr. C. N. Ramachandran]

_**Contents**_
 Foreword / 9 The Translators / 11 Traveller / 13 Wasn’t It You? /
14 A Parrot / 15 Words Like Pearls / 16 I Become Myself / 17 Ahalye / 18 Equality?/
19 Then and Now / 21 Desire / 23 Aspiration / 25 Time Continues to Slip Away / 26
We Laugh Once / 28 The Song of Tajmahal / 30 A Song / 32 Evenings / 33 Domes / 35
Boat / 37 Ladder / 38 Light / 40 I Am Now Forty / 42 A Dreary Prospect / 45 The 
Daughter of Fire / 47 Milestones / 49 Soliloquy of a Devadasi’s Daughter / 51 Priority/
54 Void / 56 Seeds of War / 58 To Poetry / 60 Phoenix / 61 Must Go Beyond This World/
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