Amit Majmudar

The Book of Transformations

1. The Poet Becomes a Bird

Horace: Ode 2.20

Enough with this terrestrial tarrying—

No ordinary wings will carry me,

A poet-seer, dual in shape,

Through flowing air. Above all hate,

I’ll give this city up. Maecenas,

Although my bloodline is a pauper’s,

You called me friend. I will not die.

The Styx’s waves can’t sink me.

Already I’m shapeshifting, white

And winged, my coarse legs banished!

From my fingers to my shoulders,

I am sprouting lightweight feathers!

My fame surpassing Icarus

And Daedalus, by music’s grace

I visit the sighing Bosporus,

The Berber sands, the steppes up north.

Black Sea tribes, Serbs acting tough

Around our troops, farflung Ukrainians,

Spanish craftsmen, those who draw

Their water from the Rhone: they’ll know me.

My funeral will be meaningless.

No dirge, no fuss, no ugly bawling—

Omitting all superfluous honors,

Curb the clamor at my tomb.

2. Arjuna Begs the Universal Form to Become Krishna Again

Vyasa: Bhagavad-Gita, Chapter 11: 45-55

Arjuna said,

45.

                                           ...I rejoice to have seen what has never been seen before,

but my mind is atremble with terror! Oh God-

                                           Overmastering, universe-housing God, 

have mercy! Have that be the form that you show me— 

46.

                                         Crowned, with a club and a discus in hand—

how I long to behold you like that!

                                         Oh shape of the cosmos, with thousands of arms,

become your four-armed form.

The Blessed Lord said,

47.

                                          Yogically showing myself in this highest of forms—

primordial, infinite, cosmic, and built

                                           Out of brilliance—I favored you, Arjuna.

I’ve never revealed it to anyone other than you.

48.

                                          Not by studying Vedas and doing a sacrifice right,

not by gifts or by grueling austerities—champion Kuru,

                                          In a form such as this, in this world

full of men, I am visible only to you.

49.

                                          Do not tremble or grow so disoriented seeing

my ghastly form! With your fear gone away,

                                          Let your mind be at ease once again

and perceive me in this form!

Sanjaya said,

50.

                                          Having said this to Arjuna, Vasudev showed

himself in the shape of himself as before.

                                          The mahatma, consoling the terrified one,

became handsome and pleasant again.

Arjuna said,

51.

Seeing the clement, human shape

                                          of you, the kindling of mankind,

I have gone back to normal now.

                                           I am composed in mind.

The Blessed Lord said,

52.

It’s difficult to see

                                         that form of mine you saw.

Even the devas always

                                         hope to behold it.

53.

I can’t be witnessed in

                                          the way you witnessed me

Through scripture, sacrifice,

                                          austerity, or charity.

54.

Arjuna, you flamethrower

                                            facing the foe, it’s only through

Devotion never deviating that

                                            I’m truly known, perceived, and pierced.

55.

Exalting me, endeavoring for me,

                                           devoutly mine, detached, and free

Of enmity for any being—son

                                            of Pandu, such a person comes to me.

3. Dante Transcends the Human

Dante Alighieri: Paradiso, Canto I, lines 61-72

...And all at once, a day was layered on

              the day, it seemed, as if the One who can

              adorned the heavens with a second sun.

Since Beatrice had fixed her steady eyes

              on those eternal wheels, on her did I

              fix my own gaze now, drawn down from on high.

Gazing on her caused a change in me,

              as Glaucus changed, tasting the grass that made him

              consort with other devas in the sea.

Evolving throughuman—there’s no word that says

              just how that feels. Let this example serve

              anyone this experience will grace.

4. Faust Encounters the Infernal Poodle

Goethe, Faust: Part One, excerpt from lines 1239-1317

FAUST:

This room is one we have to share,

so Poodle, quit your howling,

quit your growling!

Such a nuisance—I can’t bear

to have you near me. One of us

has got to leave this house.

I’m done with hospitality—

the door is open, you’re free to leave.

But what is this I’m seeing?

Could this ever happen naturally?

Is this shadowplay? or is this real?

My poodle’s growing long and broad!

He’s heaving up with force,

his form a dog’s no more!

What specter have I brought

Into the house?

He’s like a hippopotamus,

With fearsome teeth and eyes of fire!

...Behind the oven now it stands,

Dilating like an elephant

Until it fills the room entire

And deliquesces, mists away....

Don’t swirl to the ceiling! Hey!

Heel here, before your master’s feet!

You’ll see my threat is not in vain—

I’ll singe you with a holy flame!

         [From behind the oven, as the mist drifts away, MEPHISTOPHELES steps out

         dressed like a traveling scholar.]

MEPHISTOPHELES:

Why all this fuss? How may I be of service, Master?

5. The Lover Makes an Unpleasant Discovery

Charles Baudelaire: “Les Metamorphoses du Vampire”

Meanwhile, the girl with the strawberry kisser

(Writhing about like a snake on a brazier,

Corset of iron massaging her bust)

Dribbled these words, all pregnant with musk:

—<<It’s down to a science. My lips get wet

As conscience drowns in the deeps of a bed.

My breasts, in triumph, can dry all tears,

Make old men chortle, despite their years.

If you see me unveiled, in the nude, I’ll replace

The moon and the sun and the stars in space!

My scholarly darling, I’m learned in charms

When I smother a man in my fearsome arms

Or abandon my breasts and let him nibble,

Timid, libidinous, vigorous, feeble.

For me on this mattress, this swoon and swell,

Impotent angels would damn themselves.>>

When she’d sucked the marrow from my bone,

I turned to her with a languid groan

And saw the thing I went to kiss—

A leathery sack, all gluey with pus!

I shut both eyes, gone cold with fright.

When I looked again in the vivid light,

Beside me was not the doll who seemed

Eager to stock up on my heme

But a trembling, skeletal jumble of pain

Crying the squeaks of a weathervane

Or the sign on an iron rod outside

That swings in the wind on a winter’s night.

Amit Majmudar is a poet, novelist, essayist, and translator. Recent books include Twin A: A Memoir (Slant Books, 2023), The Great Game: Essays on Poetics (Acre Books, 2024), the hybrid work Three Metamorphoses (Orison Books, 2025), and Things My Grandmother Said: Poems (Knopf, 2026).