Classic Poem

It is you who safeguard the wide,
sprawling camp and there is no need
to post guards across its spaces,
where the young elephants stand tied
to their posts, bursting with strength
as they shift in place, trunks swaying,
with high-stepping gait and the ripple of bells,
uplifted tusks, foreheads like the crescent moon
and angry stares, giant feet, huge necks,
the fragrant liquid of musth humming with bees
as if they were mountains flowing honey,
their enormous heads oozing pus as men
wearing no swords sleep safely beside them
below the shade of a white umbrella
hung with garlands like the moon resting
up near them in the sky and streaming rays;
and there are rows of roofs that are plaited
of soft sugarcane, covered with sprouts of the finest
swaying paddy, variously resplendent as if
we were at the site of a festival, a vast
place full of noise, where to the endless drumming of pestles,
maddened men dance the trance dance of the kuravai,
wearing green tumpai garlands with petals like gold, and thrust
within them are palmyra leaves, tall and swaying,
and the rustling rises and eddies like the waters of the ocean!
O killer king! You who rule those on high
Kolli hill and with the tribute humbly given you by kings
satisfy the families of those who come to you in need.
You have the glance of an elephant! You are like
Murugan, thirsting for victory! May you live long,
greatness! with your immeasurable wealth! Our king!
You have the power to give without stinting so that
shining, eloquent tongues sing of you and praise
no others! I heard that the land that is ruled
by Mantaran Ceral Irumporai is like the world
of the gods and I have come and with joy I have seen it!
Greatness! Untiring! Whose army roams abroad!
Because you never rest, you assure an abundance of rice!