Classic Poem

I will play on my black kinai drum that has
its clear eye and its new full cover stretched
tightly around it and wrapped with straps
so that it looks like the white belly of a sharp-clawed tortoise
and this is what I will sing: “You drove away poverty
from your musicians who bring you joy,
giving them the tribute humbly offered
by kings who opposed you and who own many elephants
skilled at their work of war, always
breaking down enemy walls, their fragrant
temples coated with powdered lime, their giant necks
adorned with ornaments marked with flowers, who move dispersed
in various formations, who with their lofty tusks and their dark
huge, harsh trunks were stationed near the guarded forests
of the great kings! May his worthy feet glow!” And the king of those men
there who acclaimed this and the many other ways I praised. . . . .
In the large courtyard of the palace which is
a delight to approach, he wanted me to advance toward his worthy feet
in their excellent anklets, he who owns the royal drum
of victory that is beaten after conquests!
Not despising my low status, thinking only
of his stature and his worth, didn't he give me
elephants like mountains? Didn't he give me horses
with cropped manes? Didn't he give me herds
of cattle filling his courtyard? Didn't he give me
fields with farmers who are part of the property,
and all so quickly it seemed a waking dream? He is that lord
filled with love, the great overlord of the Puliyar! If one only
mentions the name of Celvak Katunko Valiyatan who has elephants
with their tusks and rough trunks, he whose energies are imposing
in battle, then his enemies will dip their lofty umbrellas and without
a moment's hesitation they will send their tribute to him here!
And so may he live on for more aeons than the grains of sand by the resounding
Porunai River that washes the city of Vañci named for the tree
with dull-colored leaves, more than the grains
of rice that grow in all the fields around the many cities of that land!