As if an incarnation!

BEAUTIFUL HILLARY
K.M. Shah Raza Niyazi, trans. by Chirag Bangdel

I asked a friend of mine:
Aren't you virtuous?
Don't you ever become a pedestrian?
Don't you ever misinterpret
The guidelines of Holy Koran---
And don't you ever atrocious turn
Upon any woman?

I asked:
Don't you ever anticipate and wait for anyone---
When all of a sudden
A stranger you meet,
Don't you a little humble turn
And politely address in
Greeting her?

And, isn't Hillary---
Hillary Rodham,
Clinton Hillary:
Her face,
Her disposition, her demeanours
Good?
His response was:
"Beautiful indeed she is!
As if an incarnation!"

From the publisher's note:

The first motive of the creation of this poetic collection is the desire to honor the women, on the global level, through honoring Mrs. Hillary Rodham Clinton...

These English renderings of Nepali poems are a new venture, and might be new in sound exotic to the American taste [sic]. This is our fervent hope that these outpourings of Nepali poets and poetesses in the purity of their emotions cannot be underrated. These poems are permeated with the softness of heart, beauty and subtlety of expression. Scholarly expressions are not given much importance. Scant gloominess is there. One would find the absorbing beauty of a moonlit night in many of these poems.

Usually, when a check-in attendant of the Bookstacks Department comes across this book in the return bins for the first time, they exclaim, "Oh my God, there's a book of Nepali poems about Hillary Clinton!" and informs other employees of the book's existence. At first I thought it was funny, and was going to be like, "OMG look all five blog readers! There's a book of Nepali poems about Hillary Clinton!" But then I actually started to skim it and it was no longer funny; instead it became endearing. The translations are perfect even if awkward or incorrect--it's got that type of English no native-speaker could ever produce. These "poets and poetesses" remind me of how South Side speed skater Shani Davis inexplicably had a huge Dutch following during the last winter Olympics despite the media portraying him as selfish for not joining fellow Americans in the team race so he could concentrate on his individual ones. "Mrs. Hillary," or her serious/desperate American fans, should take this monograph (Hillary Clinton in Poems, edited by Kanchan Pudasainin, LC call #: PK2598.A2E8813 2000) into consideration if or when they try to push for her presidential candidacy in '08.