Maybe

Some faces never fade,
Some moments never die;
For a war-torn life,
Those remain a symbol of peace.

They sat—the man and the woman, side by side;
Silently glow twenty five candles
To burn a few pages of memories
Of a little girl whom the angels brought for them
On one such day to shine on their eyes.

She would lie on his lap
Gently holding her mom’s hand,
With eyes broadened would endlessly tell
What amazing things she had discovered.
Every day, he would dream of a new tale
To tell her, else how would she sleep?

The candles burn
The pages burn
Burns the last glimpse of those innocuous eyes
Burn colourful wings of the butterfly
Burns a new school tunic.

The man dreamt of a new tale,
But the evening dug the grave for it.
The tiny bird was snatched away
From a tiny nest that her parents built,
Not even knowing, why...why?

None could see her again;
Maybe, she was killed
Maybe, she was sold
Maybe, she was rescued
Maybe, she grew up
Somewhere, in another distant moon.

The father still dreams of her,
The mother still sobs alone,
Maybe, she still too weeps
If she is alive; maybe, she’s not!

Maybe, she needs to dance
Amidst smoke and stench
For to carry her father’s dream
Of feeling how precious is life;
Maybe, sleep evades her eyes
For a tale to be told by her papa,
Maybe, she is too tired of tales of life,
If she is alive; maybe, she’s not!

Her papa roams in and searches for
Within faces of every girl of her age,
Ceaselessly guessing, “Isn’t she my doll?”
Maybe, if she is alive; maybe, she’s not!

The dream story lies hidden
Within moaning soul of an old father,
Maybe, to remain forever untold;
Maybe, destiny does not permit
Some promises to be kept...maybe!

(A repost )

Me

Don’t dig me up

Roots are still wet

Fresh leaves of Spring

Had enough sunshine

Rain I love, the weeping tales

Of dove beneath grey eyebrows.

Don’t dig me up

The pearl is yet to shine

Moments to walk long

Rustles of brown leaves

Strewn on pavement of life

Undusted for so many years

Don’t dig me up

Down to the stairs still

Childhood gestures

An inseparable illusion

Of me, my tree, my seed

Of memories neatly painted.

The country soul !!

I listen to the music of my mind

Eternally mirroring those moments unkind

The words that fail

In blows of gale

Of yes or no of doubts unsigned.

I walk so far from country soul

Judging the road or a rapid roll

The steps that haste

In sleepless rest

Of stony heart of a racing droll.

I sing a song of a lonely bird

Whistling pain of an erring nerd

The tune that splits

In lighted streets

Of grieving notes of a rural bard.

I whisper tales to rains and spring

Passions tied to cluttered string

The dreams that weep

In gallows strip

Of losing nativity in urban bling.

Life traverses the time's way

Living needs to earn and pay

It runs and flees

From inner peace

Through shining black to a boring grey.

(I wrote this decades back...nice to find it back from an old diary)

Now I am

Poet, Shamsur Rahaman, is one of my dearest poets of post-Tagore era. He is one of the most revered poets, not only in his own country, Bangladesh, but in every corner of the world, for his rich poetic creations saturated with righteousness, boldness and passion. His contributions to Bengali literature have brought a new dimension to the style and structure of Bengali poems and touched almost every aspect of human emotions.
Here is one of my favourite poem of Shamsur Rahaman, "Ekhon Ami", that I have attempted to transliterate.


I get startled, now and then,

Hearing someone’s going to somewhere,

In transience of a moment

The pool of my soul splashes,

“Going to where and why?”

Leaving numerous questions,

Like this or that, tremble upon

The lines over my lips and iris.



Hands sheath into the veil of

Those clouds, sodden in sorrows,

If ever I offer it to anyone;

The deepest core of my heart

Fervidly quivers, now and then;

I am easily startled now

Hearing someone’s going to somewhere.



My heart breaks, very often,

Seeing something is broken somewhere,

Am scared to see the little sapling

Of rose losing the sparkle;

The boyhood scene of a free kite,

Falling and floating, in a noontide sky,

Often reappears in my eyes now;

Quite a few dead horses,

In the realms of my childhood

Are lying dispersed over the grassland;

These thoughts infuse me

With a terrible fright, nowadays.

Fine I remain, sometimes,

In a dimly lighted corner of my room,

Absorbed between the leaves of the book;

Amidst the rustles of fallen leaves

It brings a solemn news of growing age,

When some elders disappears

Just like the setting of the sun,

I spend the draining time playing hopscotch

With my mind in sheer darkness.



Sadness just keeps on shedding

Long shadows of sorrows—

Upon the lines of the face;

It pours loneliness into my soul,

Forlorn I am, so often, nowadays,

Feel so lonely, so often, nowadays.

The day I was born

Long nights and days sped by

To yearn and earn and count and die,
In loving spree and dreams and cry,
In heaps of petals fallen and dry.

Swirling serpents—smoky dread

Invading sky to paint and spread,
Erasing signs of innocent myths—

Cradled so long in cerebral piths.

Promises faded, one by one,

Nothing was lost and none has won;

Reaped not harvest, seeds not sown,

The last wish awaits the last ribbon.

Moments flee, pages burn,

And ashes fill the memories’ urn;

Yet the sojourn shines in glee

When life recounts its first turn.

(A repost)

Mera kuch saman tumhare paas pada hai

"Mera kuch saman tumhare paas pada hai ..." is one of my favourite poems written by Gulzar....I tried  my best to let it carry the deep emotions and wonderfully woven words while translating it into English....never mind my shortcomings in getting near to the original....


A part of me is still lying around you,
A few moist days of a long-parted monsoon,
And a night wrapped in a sodden veil of fuzzy scribbles;
Let all images of that night fade into vacuity,
Let all I left there find me back here as a complete me.

Heard the rustles of leaves….aren’t there?
And those gentle tunes of falling leaves that
Slipped off my ears casting a fleeting kiss once and reappeared.
Somewhere the forsaken twig in the Fall is still trembling;
Let the wailing branch be wished adieu too,
Let all I left there find me back here as a complete me.

Sharing beneath a sole dripping umbrella, you and I—
Half-drenched and a bit dry—
And the warmth in me that we shared too;
Those a few wet thoughts, perhaps, still be lying around the bed.
Let it all be set free; let all be just mine,
Let all I left there find me back here as a complete me.

The sweet memories of a string of moonlit nights,
And of the beauty spot prettifying your shoulder;
The intoxicating fragrance of soggy paste of henna
And a few freaks of silly play of blame and regret;
And a few weird promises never kept.
Let it all fill me to the deepest down in me,
Let all I left there find me back here as a complete me.

Just grant me the parting acquiescence of the self,
For my lone walk to the grave,
For me to sleep forever….beside you.

(A repost)

Tolerance in life

When I wrote my Civil Services exams, “Tolerance in life”, was the essay that I opted for without much bargaining. After thirty-four years in service, neither “tolerance” nor “life” bears any discernible evidence of existence in me, perhaps. It is not an obituary of my life or my tolerance that has prompted me to write a few lines here. I have almost a different influencer to seduce my thoughts and pen to express which I have never felt worthy enough to be expressed before.

The tolerance, as I grew up and learnt, does not bear the meaning nowadays except in those dull dictionaries. It is a concept that sleeps silently as a sepia photograph inside an ancestral album. It’s a loss of inheritance! And, it has so far been so intense a belief for me that I started really doubting if it ever existed. When Professor Hilbert, a great mathematician in Gottingen University was once asked by the then Nazi Minister of Education, “Is it really true, Professor, that your institution suffered so much from the departure of the Jews and their friends?” to which Professor responded in a surprisingly calmness, “Suffered? No, not at all. It didn’t suffer, Herr Minister. It just doesn’t exist anymore!” Similar had been my feelings about the existence of tolerance in life.

I was fortunate to have grown in a home, where I had had enough—voluntary or compulsive—exposure to the presence of some renowned people in the field of academics, and, knowingly or unknowingly, my childhood learning was grossly influenced by the humility, wisdom and expression of tolerance of those stalwarts. When the smell of the Jesuit fathers was yet to evaporate from my cheeks, my exposure to a new world of rebellion left quite a substantial dint onto that innocent growth of tolerance in me and it died pretty swiftly as I entered into the prime of my youth. Yet, the myth surrounding the Bengali intelligentsia has its crafted veil to be neatly draped around me and I remained tolerant without being one in the core. The life has also learnt to be lifeless in the meanwhile. So, the game was a pact, and the pact was the essence of the game. Collaborating together to defraud the other over a bet who gets bankrupt early.

As I was saying about my childhood; the phase one never forgets even in the worst departure from life. I continued to see those learned men discussing in ever smiling face—sitting upon the open balcony facing the road and the public—over a cup of tea. People used to gather and listen to them. Whenever any question or a contrary view would come even from any naïve source, they used to explain what they had so far learnt, where it would be found as a reference and would patiently express eagerness to know where the new knowledge came from. I never found them agitated on any occasion.

Over the years, the wise men faded, one by one, and once I realized that time has silently put out the last lamp too. And, my entire life of tolerance has had its silent death in such an inauspicious manner that I don’t even remember when and where I last found it alive. The life continued to thrive in its proud vest carrying a dead soul inside. And, I never felt it an unenjoyable situation in my pursuit of illusory knowledge and peace. It’s been a win-win case, with both winning, in failing to live through, with utter serenity and fulfilment.  

A few days ago, my wife received a link from a friend in Bangladesh, which provided us an opportunity to listen to her octogenarian father, a renowned academician in the neighbouring country and the world, delivering an address to the Alumni of a famous university at its Reunion meet. I floated through his lecture. Such humility, such patience, those chosen words that never hurt but inspire only, and those fluent waves of thoughts intermingled with the innocence of a child and the awe in experiencing the grand texture of knowledge; it all surrounded me and carried me to my lost childhood. I could see my transformed belief of a non-existent tolerance evaporating into a shapeless sky while fresh air of innocence began to fill in. My thoughts began to liberate a whole new wave of vitality; a lost feeling of reassuring the self that nothing can rob your innocence so long tolerance allows your life to pursue what it aspires truly at the end—the truth. The seeds of wisdom lie only in tolerance. The tolerance is not a compromise, not an adjustment, not a bargain; it is to withstand all illusions that life presents in its trial, to keep life unperturbed by comfort and luxury of thoughts, to steer away life from the traps of unlearning the pure knowledge, to keep the innocent lamp of childhood aflame forever in the midst of strong winds of misleading opinions and manufactured doctrines. It is a strong yes to say a strong no even sacrificing the life in enduring utter humiliations that the mankind has ever experienced. It is what that keeps the life alive.

The innocence of the soul of a child of eighty years has so gracefully inspired me to disinter the hidden gems in the deepest of my treasures of life—the essence of tolerance in life—that I start believing again, “Yes, the life still bears the prospect of resurrection.”

Naming life !!

Every life has a unique tale to tell. It scripts itself as life meanders on—staggering in aspirations and desperations, enamoured of passions and illusions, armed with name and fame, induced with dreams and deeds, and inspired with wills and nerve—in wealth of ripening. Numerous bends on its course—some meaningful, some memorable, some forgotten or some tragic—are testimony of its conciliation with the circumstances for sake of securing own existence. Yet, it presents a sheer bafflement in defining itself with an identity—an identity that establishes, who is who, which is which and what is what, in the mirror of the world around. It raises an awkward question, “Do I exist sans a name?”

What is in a name? Even an elementary scholar knows what Juliet expressed in her soliloquy. The name binds the bond, tears apart too. But, does it deny the existence too. It raises my perplexity and I carry it for so long.

Once I met a little girl and her brother (I wrote about them a decade back on my blog too) who did not have any name. Is life such meaningless that we presume that they don’t exist at all? Nameless is not faceless, yet the story of a life seems suffered when it is exposed to social scrutiny. But, is such an average assessment defines existence in life ?

In peaceful settings of Manderley, second Mrs Winter didn’t have any name. She narrated the tale of her life—her dreams, seclusion, haunting shadow of Rebecca, indifference of her husband—the killer of his first wife, and gradual accession to confidence. All without name in the entire novel.

Jane, an orphan raised at the home of her aunt, when was asked by Mr. Rochester, “Am I hideous?”, replied affirmative with certainty. She was the governess in his house, love him, he didn’t disclose about his earlier marriage and it all surface when she was about to get married with him. Rochester had a name and fame too. Yet, his real face is hidden. He was still bearing a faceless identity before Jane, and with certainty. They got married and the novel had a happy conclusion. Neither name nor fame nor its suppression was a matter of rejection in life.

Meursault was enraged and brutally killed the Arabian. The glimmers of the sun on the edges of his rapier generated so much irritation that he couldn’t resist himself from such crime, and without any future remorse. Was it the Sun, or the Arab man or the knife or the hatred or the intent of crime to be blamed; or the namelessness of the Arabian? The killer had a name and pride of race, but the Arabian didn’t. The novel of Camus evolved around the life who was nameless native and justice was faceless. The stranger remains a stranger so long life doesn’t attempt to know it. Knowledge is, perhaps, also something which exists when known. Does life have similar existence? I exist only when you know that I exist and get attributed by a name to be known? My confusions have grown up with me since childhood.

Jeanne’s life unfurled itself in exploration of delight in everything and died in disillusionment of its staleness. She tells her life through the events of her life. Nothing more than that. Yet, the existence retained itself without her professed identity in social mirror. She spent her end days forsaken—the dreams dried, emotions died and prospects baffled. In concluding sentence, she tells Rosalie, the maid and the mother of her husband’s son, “The life, you see, Rosalie, is not so good or so bad, what people think.’

Life, perhaps, is an impression. An impression has complexity of explaining the truth and value. We run after it without knowing, and leave it when experience. Our pride confines us only to its grave.

Last moments...

It stretches the day a little longer

Memories of the Heaven’s blue

Still not died, still not dried up;

The sky is dust of gold

Still alluring

Floating in those vacant eyes

For a few moments left;

The life is a gem,

Spoilt by a failed palmist,

The band of clouds

Over the wings of horizon

Crimson—a stream of blood—

Through the darkness of Hell

Whispering tale of death-eaters;

A dream yet survives

To be there, to be there,

Carrying wounds,

Scars on the path

On those weary feet;

Still a dream survives,

To be there, to be there,

Miles away the home is peace.

Destiny

Dreams breaking into memories

Passions destining …keeping some,

Some not….why?…perhaps,

Only seashells know

The epitaph !

Between leaves of time 

Sleeps the untold tale of life,

In dreams of love and love of dreams.

Smudging the margin in between

The trust and deceit, walk away,

Hand in hand, in silence

Without signifying who you are 

And who am I;

Only the kisses lie scattered--

Forlorn--in the corner of the room.

Despair

The moment is fading...between the pages of time…

Beneath the clouds—building courage for the fall—

Denser and darker, in complete silence.

The earth is split, spoilt in emotions unchained,

Colours sacrificed for painting a black yashmak,

The day and the night meet no more...kiss no more...

O the traveller of the noontide! Stay far,

I shall walk on in the dark, beneath the flapping

Wings of that night heron, subtly wiping the moonshine,

Denying the sense of being and becoming.

The lone star on the west is just a smudged dot,

An earnest effort to survive, shapeless...inert,

Yet, to trudge up the stairs for it to live a little longer.

O the Supreme! Riven into many, you broke us in many,

Pouring the venomous wisdom into our ears,

Deafening, with endless call for unity and peace;

Turn your wretched head, open your morphine eyes

See the devils designing weapons, honest they are,

Arming to untie the bond that has loosened within,

To scatter us—fragmented and faithless for long,

United they are, unbroken in dream and deed.

Why deceiving us more? The faith is a licence to deceit.

The spring shall be no more...the sailor will

No more chase the horizon...waves will only rise,

For just a final fall...to break into bubbles,

I can see the shore sinking....drinking....the last drop

Of his beloved...the blue ocean...

I can see the forest advancing, now and then,

The lonely moon weeping in the grey…alone,

The flickering lamp is about to be burnt out.

Youth

For years they have been there--stoically oblivious
To the world slipping out of time--caged in the dungeon of
Down-shelves in my library; perchance I met an old diary there--
Tucked into a torn coat staring deep down at my heart.
Whispered, "Remember me?"
"No" was hesitantly unstripped between my lips.
"Old you are! Ugly and broken!"
"You are old too--forsaken and deadened"
"No, look at me, I am your youth;
I am your love, inspiration, aspiration and dream"
My thought travelled through forests and meadows
Of years, months, hours and moments;
Slowly it took me inside--burrying me
Between the pages that still bears my own odour--
Kissed upon my temple and whispered again,
"Goodbye"
Through the mellowing dirge, I closed my eyes,
I felt dying, then died, then opened my eyes again,
Before closing it finally and whispered,
"Goodbye".

The journey to nativity

Darkness….lovely darkness…the smoke around..

Swirling up…sketching elf in white cloak…fading somewhere;

Alone…the silence…mind drowning thoughts endlessly…

Lay me there….sink me deep…to the native land

Where once I floated for a while…

Before laughter came out of loud cries…

Where it all started before it all about to end so soon…

Destiny has already scripted the epilogue….in absolute darkness.

Being a stranger...

Am I just a name? Or just me what they see?

Or a stranger to the way they know?

Am I just what seemingly I am—in life and beyond?

Or just a few footprints on my walk

On a path lost forever in a meadow unknown?

Am I a soul, far away from life’s roll—

Stuck onto a changeless boll—

Like an unnamed flower in an unknown knoll?

Or a path never walked before, yet awaiting,

Or a dream forsaken in dreamer’s eyes, yet shining,

Or a trampled hope in a frozen cell, yet undying?

Maybe there is a beauty—a beauty forever—

In being a stranger to the way they know

Or to me or to what seemingly I am.

Am I just a few senses that paint me as I am,

Of unchained thoughts of defeats and scars,

Of motion stalled and stymied wars,

Of glorious triumphs and crowned stars?

Or are they just what I lose, one by one,

In becoming a stranger to what they see in me—

To me or what seemingly I am.

Perhaps, there is a beauty—a beauty forever—

Of knowing the way I become a stranger to me

Of becoming a stranger to the way I know myself

Of refining an image of being a stranger within—

To myself indeed—or the way they see,

Or what seemingly I am—in life and beyond.

Destiny !!

Destiny reigns; silent and ageless in the

Mortuary of passions and thoughts;

An indisputable certainty in the vacuity  

Of an eternal flow of senses—within and without,

For a deadened soul to reprieve and reproach.



Life denies life and death derides death;

Delight and sorrow walk away—hand in hand;

The proximity of the present erases the face

Of the past—the moments, hours and years;

Shrivelled eyes fail to mirror a path unbroken.



Time smudges the image of a decent moon

Painted upon a dark face of young night;

Jacob and Esau battles within her womb

With promises of two distinct futures;

Never knowing which will shine the dawn.



From the vacuity it rises and dies within;

The margin between the fortune and misfortune

Is wiped up in the hollowness of events;

Enduring a greater fall to attain a loftier ascent—

Oblivious of the certainty scripted for the End.



Destiny defines; the present is of sheer suspense

Secreted within the bankruptcy of a dead past,

And the prospects of an unborn future;

As night is stifled between the legacy of a day spent

And the certainty of a fresh dawn.

Love is a ticket to eternity !!

The life is an amazing experience. The amazement emerges from not from its uitility or futility; it simply finds itself in love that mesmerises the moments spent by. Love portrays itself in romance or in affection or in reverence or in trust or in understanding or in dreams; but it hides itself beneath images it paints upon the soul. Love is a self-validating ticket to eternity that blesses us with the birth of a soul and carries a license to free ride through the walks of life with a companion to explore one of such images it leaves at the show. It resides in those moments only--shorter or longer--for the ride together. The images changes with the company it keeps one for the ride. The portrait of a mother floats in the sense so long the warmth of her stays around. The journey does not demand the presence of the comapanion to feel the delight of the moments of love. The ticket grants the ride with someone, without someone, with memories of someone or with failing to remember someone and even with the company of a sense of being only--with someone incomprehensible or with nature or the just wholeness of spiritual contentment. The images of the first fits of romance or infatuation spread itself in moments of dilemma, trepidation and emotion for the soul that travels along. The images of confiding the triumphant delight of the first encounter of romance or of tearing apart--of great expectations or deadening despair--with a friend sketch the moments of togetherness with rich colours of confidence and trust in itself. Anything prior to e posterior to does not relate to the same set of imageries. Every image is differently associated to the moment of the journey. These portraits reveal itself within and are buried within. They remain only with the soul that carries the ticket and none can ever behold it beyond the self where they were born. Buried under they may fade away forever or may resurface on walk through the memories. But, whatever be the destiny of each such portraits fruits of love that glorifies the moments of riding together, for sometime, to an eternity never preconceived. It never stops blessing us with the sense of walking together till the senses are gone. It carries the mission of bringing joy within, treasuring the memories within and glorifying the moments of being together in the walk of life. It leads us from nowhere to nowhere ever brightening the sense of living with simple joy in between.

Couldn't.....

Couldn't ride that fast car
Couldn't be someone
Couldn't be a moon for you, mom

Couldn't be a sun for you, dad
Years smiled to let months grin
Moments sobbed to let days cry loud
Couldn't restrain leafs destined to fall
At the end of road, I stand alone
With just a lone rose for you

Summer Vacation Topic--Kids Zone !

Waste no time to become good….believe me…believe in yourself…you are good….spend every moment of life to remain just that….just not let it turn bad in exploration of becoming too good for this world….

The summer reminds me of those long vacations….of those idle afternoon hours of sitting alone by a deserted pond when neither fishes spoke to me nor did I….and of a simpler life…of crying every time when Joan sang Guantanamera….of people still having time to be by your side….of no racing around in the hollow of goodness !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Take care, kids !

An element of renewal

I walk free. Yes, after quitting the job that I could neither enjoy being into nor could it enjoy being nurtured within dispassionate bed of thoughts of someone utterly oblivious to the needs and deeds it honours. I make it memorable in tearing of all cords of relationship. And, I walk free following narrow lane piercing straight through an overhung fortune of unemployment. In spree of pouring sense of liberty I had another journey of my own tonight in promising a faint dawn of hunger sooner.

Deep into winter the evening is slowly draping herself in a dark bluish veil. A soft moon would soon emerge. A few stars would peep through mists and twinkle. Nippy breeze binged on stinging with intense sullenness while faint tunes of Christmas chimes roamed in scrawny alleys of buried civilization of a proud city.

I walk on to embrace a new year—a wide new year of age-old hunger that I have so passionately desired for. A new horizon of freedom stealthily waits behind the faded texture of a nomadic life.