Custard-apple mustard-parrots
Custard-apple mustard-parrots 85 Pomegranate -bees 86 Won’t you speak, my wife, oh please? Why should I?
On what pretence?
Speaking makes me sick and tense!
SkITTER-CHITTER FRl/IT BATS
Skitter-chitter fruit bats The banana bat’s going to wed So ring the bellflowers red.
The titmice are playing drums With broomsticks on their head.
84 These nursery rhymes are in variations of the East Bengal (now Bangladesh) dialect in which the inflections differ from standard Bengali. These inflections are not reflected in the translations.
85 Custard-apple mustard-parrots: For the sake of the metre, what is really ‘parrots in custard-apple trees’ (in Bengali the word for ‘parrot’ rhymes with the word for ‘custard- apple’) has been condensed into two rhyming compound words.
86 Pomegranate-bees: Similarly in this case, where the original literally reads ‘Bees in pomegranate trees’.
The bears are eating tamarind
The bears are eating tamarind; hurry, come and see Six old women are rolling under the lichen tree. The spade hits the grinding stone The mustard creaks to the bone Mr Pumpkin as his witness, Spinach starts to moan. Why do you cry, dear Spinach, rolling in the dust? My little boy will eat his rice With only fried fish, I trust.
Sleepy eyes peepy eyes
Translated by Sampurna Cbattarji from the Bengali original
7 \aye rey ghoom jaaye re gboom'
Sleepy eyes peepy eyes Sandman’s looking for you Sleepwalking through the door Are catfish one and two.
SCRAWLY-MOLLY SKIN-CRAWLY
Translated by Sampurna Cbattarji from the Bengali original Ikid mikid cbaam cbikid'
Scrawly^molly skim crawly Box his ears Majumdar 87 Down swoops Damodar.
87 Majumdar: A Bengali surname.
Damodar’s pots and pans are nice Within four walls there’s heaps of rice. Cleaning the rice took all morning Indaws dropped in without warning. Fly fell into the rice that’s made Scraped it off with a sharp spade The spade has gone blunt and dead Now go eat the smithy’s head.
NlTTER-NATTER
Translated by Sampurna Cbattarji from the Bengali original Tching biching'
Nitter-natter Sondndaw’s chatter A spider fell down splitter^ splatter. The spider fought all arms and legs Seven pumpkins laid seven eggs.
The blackest cat that pdrled
Translated by Sampurna Cbattarji from tbe Bengali original Tkey bedaal kaalo'
The blackest cat that purled Down the Ganga hurled On the bolsters curled His beauty lit up the world!
Shilly-shally asked for rice
Translated by 5 ampurna Cbattarji from the Bengali original 'Ecb-chi mech-chi dbaan chailo'
Shilly- shally asked for rice
Inside the grain he found some mice
The king of birds fished in a pail
The captured serpent wagged its tail
Tasty-hasty rice we sing
Cut off the thief’s hand says the king.
Translated by Sumanyu Satpathy from the Bbojpuri-Hi'ndi original 'Sri GanesbjL
This rhyme uses the strategy of rapid and successive decontextualization in order to generate the sense of nonsense. Some words are corruptions of well- known words. The nonsense here is also the result of extreme colloquialism and the technique of using words from the previous lines but by changing the context. The rhythm is fast, imitative of a horse on a gallop: ta-dak-ta-dak-ta- dak-ta-dak.
On his horse Ganeshji hurls.
Resplendent in nine hundred pearls,
Of which just one was green.
Our guru taught a spelling scheme. 88
Panditji did blessings give
May you for six lakh seasons live.
Many lakhs of lotions bought.
Twenty Delhi gajmots 89 sought.
Delhi’s Minni is a one-eyed thief,
88 spelling scheme: In the original, the term used is ‘pandit mala’, which is a mnemonic table, similar to the multiplication tables, containing formulae to guide the pre-primary learner to spell words.
89 gajmot: A large pearl.
The peacock-master is Thief-in'Chief The Thief-in-Chief’s arrow headed straight The arrow struck the lover’s fate.
The lover seeks a pretty lass Putting out two chairs in the grass.
Sahib, he can hurl the javelin That flies to eighty-kosh 90 Multan Travelling at eighty like a bullet One bullet after you fire to kill’t Go! Set the jungle on fire, go.
In the forest elder brother Kesho Kesho has daughters-in-law four Who play with gold nuggets in the wood. The woodpecker pecks at the wood In the wood the parakeet goes on On the riverbank the crane goes on What Ram wills will surely be.
While playing I found a cowry shell
'Khelte Kbulte'
While playing I found a cowry shell I gently let it flow with the Ganga’s swell. Mother Ganga gave me sand
To the goudnia 91 I gave the sand
The goudnia gave me bhuja I gave the bhuja to the grass-cutter The grass-cutter gave me grass I gave the grass to a cow The cow gave me milk I gave the milk to the cat
90 eighty-kosh: ‘Kosh’ is a unit of measure, roughly two kilometres.
91 goudnia: A woman of a lower caste who milk cows and sell dairy products.
142 the tenth rgsg
The cat gave me a rat I gave the rat to the kite The kite gave me a feather light I gave the king the feather The king gave me a mare On the mare I rode away Clap, for I am happy today!
The Buffalo climbed a peepal tree
Translated by Anushka Ravisbankar from the Gujarati original Taado cbadyo peepale'
The buffalo climbed a peepal tree And sucked a lemon whole;
When he flew into the yard The horse jumped in a hole.
Bluffer