Unanswered, Untranslatable

On her mother’s tongue, the word is “andho”
blind unseeing, blind’s undoing. Blind blind.

In her mother tongue, the word’s embedded
in the dim, inside the well deep with night.

“Andho-kar” is darkness, synonymous
with a sky scorned by stars, emptied of moon.

Memory is praised and plundered, rued, like
a yew tree fallen to blight. You see our

weather as foregone conclusion but berth
is not a birth except when it is one.