Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[Bubu]

Here is a poem, which I find very difficult to grasp. It’s fairly long. Given below are the first few stanzas. It’s about the river Ganges in India. I have written my comments and questions in brackets.

1 I am Ganga
Snow from the Himalayas
The keeper of water
[question-who is the keeper here? Snow or the Himalayas?]
2 I am the plains
I am the foothills
I carry the wishes of my streams
To the sea
[too flowery and metaphorical for me]
3 I am both man and woman
4 I am paper boats for children
I am habits for the fisherman
[what does habit mean here]
I am cloud for shaven monks
I reflect all movements
5 I am the bridge
I am the fort and the archer
[question-Are the words bridge and fort used metaphorically?]
Taking aim
I am the great dissolver of men
[question-what does this dissolver mean? Destroyer?
What does it destroy?]

6 I give life and I take it too.

Can anyone plz help me with the meaning?
Thanks
bubu

[cgage]

This is either a free verse poem in English or a rough translation into English in which case the meaning may seem confusing.
himalayas, I think is the keeper.
Poems are often flowery and metaphorical
Habits for the fishermen doesn't mean anything -this must be a translation into English from another language
Bridge and fort have to be metaphors.
Dissolver: In India, Hindhus like to bury the dead in the Ganges because it is holy. Therefore the river dissolves the bodies.
This is a sort of religious poem praising the river Ganges. I don't think it is translated well.
Where are you from?

[cgage]

The word habit here has no meaning here. The author may have meant to say "habitat". A habitat is where something lives. However, it is mostly used in the context of animals. For example - a tiger's habitat.
The translator must have been smoking ganga as well as translating about it :)

[asterix]

Habits for the fisherman means that it is clothes for the fisherman.
Habit, as it is used here means the dress of a particular class of people. It is rarely used nowadays, although you may hear riding habit or monk's habit sometimes.

[cgage]

I didn't think of that. Good idea. However, it seems like awkward imagery - wearing the river as a habit.
This is obviously a translation and it should be pointed out that poetry for the most part is untranslatable by its very definition.
Most poetry relies on the phonology of that particular language as well as all the various meanings of words, and inflections that speakers of a common language share. That's not to say that an artistic translator couldn't create something worthy. But it would be like a new poem then.