The song of distant meadows !!

In my sparkling youth, on a delightful day of the college picnic, an ever-smiling teacher said to me "In your stubborn state, you don't seem to allow your eyes to get wet; aren’t you, really?" I don't remember what I said that day. However, when I think back to that old time today, I feel like I would have tears in my eyes if I heard the song on those early days; and, mto ne very candid, even today, my eyes get wet often when I listen to that song.

A decade before I was born, a song was written by Shri Salil Chowdhury, and, with the immaculate rendition of the song by Shrimati Utpala Sen, it had been immortalized in hearts of music lovers. When I heard the song as a child, my heart would feel a pain. Although, it was not age to understand its contents and spirit, but it qould leave a deep imprint of agony in my heart. When I grew up, with countless loss and defeat in life, the melody of the wailing soul and the words signifying such, lead to let open the mind as a strange confluence of a pure urge emerging out from within the pain. It does not speak about the worldly desires and hardships of life, not the stale balance sheet of victory and defeat; it is the source of great human truth. This pain is blended with the decayed vibration of a fainting humanity. Even today, when I listen to the song, I feel the same. I am involuntarily torn into pieces by the rhythmic world of childhood dreams. What a spotless stream of pain in the heart, what a wonderful image of peace in the all-lost sky; This infinite expanse is the inexhaustible dream of life in the core and the selfless sacrifice of memories that weave panels around it. 

Such simple expression is possible only in the mother tongue. Yet, I dream about many more to read it, feel the flow of his poetry, the beauty of the other world of his thoughts. So I attempt its transliteration to the best of my ability.

Oh! The songs of those distant meadows!

The ballads of wild pastures!

When in a pensive corner of the day 

Do they fade into a smudged horizon?

How do they set the sky aflame?

How do dreams of those moist days

Let my unharvested soul weep in silence?     

In wantonly flow of southern breeze

What leafless words do I listen to?

In calm presence of mind 

I feel loosing these tunes

In unspoken tale of someone’s pain

As if rustling leaves swirl and cry

In sweeping wind of an autumn dusk

Closing my tired wings

I seek for a nest to rest

I crave for the bank 

In endless expanse of a fierce stream

Hours go in futile dreams

Sailing thoughts to drift and far

And, my soul finds solace in 

Trifling means of an endless journey 

I haven’t aspired anything more

But to string sweet melodies for

To pour in the urn of this world

In lonely corner of my room.

Yet, delusions of such dreams

Lay waste to the feeble nest

And, are swept away 

By a dark tempest; forever. 

The original song in Bengali is also given below :--

প্রান্তরের ও গান আমার

মেঠো সুরের গান আমার

হারিয়ে গেল কোন বেলায়

আকাশে আগুন জ্বালায়

মেঘলা দিনের স্বপন আমার

ফসলবিহীন মন কাঁদায় 

মাঝে মাঝে উদাস হাওয়ায় 

এলোমেলো কী যে শুনি

বুঝি কাহার ব্যথার ছোঁয়ায় 

হারায় আমার সুরের ধ্বনি

ঝড়ের হাওয়ায় পাতার মতন 

ঝরিয়া যায় যায় যায় যায়

ক্লান্ত ডানায় নীড় খুঁজি

অথৈ নদীর তীর খুঁজি

শুধুই আমার যায় বেলা

ভাসায়ে আশার ভেলা

অন্তবিহীন পথের পুঁজি 

অন্তরেরই সান্ত্বনায়

আমি তো চাহি নি কিছুই 

শুধু আপন নীড়ের ছায়ায়

আপন বীণার সুরে ভুবন 

ভরে দিতে প্রেমের মায়ায়

প্রেমের মায়ায় ভাঙিল সে ঘর 

ঝড়ের বায় হায় হায় হায়

Emon dine taare bola jay (এমন দিনে তারে বলা যায়)

 Incessant rain has been there today since the dawn. This brings a lot delight.

The passage of the seasons has a close connection with the human mind. I did not notice if it follow any particular trend or not. Like many others, monsoon is my favorite season. But, the second season on my list of favorites is summer. In this tropical country, people with such eccentric preferences are not to be found very often. Still, that's truly my preference. Passing through autumn and spring, my last favorite season is winter. Look, how strange is my choice. Leave aside these futile discussions. Let me share uou, which I so earnestly wish to tell. want to say.

Monsoon is truly my favorite season. To be honest, rain is always delightful to me. I love eben raining in other seasons also. However, my obsession with monsoon, the way it binds my mind, my heart, is a refined feeling.

The abundance of sky, quiet flowing of gentle breeze, each piece of nature today is welcoming those dense husky clouds. Sometimes its voice is a sharp cry, sometimes its tune carries a the swings of dirge. Raindrops set musical tone upon the leaves.   No rush is here, none has any haste; it has inspired me to pause and quietly gaze on. Those clouds have not brought any letter today. Today let them sing only. From a corner to another, let them cut through the breast of the sky, and in their procession, let them make the surroundings cry with their music of pain.   What do they talk about, what is their pain; how have they accumulated so much of tears? Whom they sacrifice all these pains before?

So many secrets inside me are seeking release today. They want to sit in front of the door of the soul even once. As if I shall not have no more secrets in me today. I will no longer be away from my inner self. Everything that exists today is ours only.   Emotions drench those newly born branches and embrace them firmly. Only you and I are alone in this darkness; holding hand in hand, sitting face to face, we float through the endless time in utter silence. Only to glrify the confluence of our muted pain.

Gurudev's song “Emon dine taare bola jay” hums on in my empty head…long time back, I translated it in English. Will you like to read?

Veiled in a yasmak of tempestuous streak of raining, 

Such is the day,

When I feel ease to confide her;

Such is the moment,

Saturated in thunderous roar of foaming nimbus,

That spreads a blanket of darkness over the sky, 

When I can let my soul lay bare before her.

Amidst gentle silence pervading all over

None can eavesdrop on our whispering exchanges;

Only two of us, facing each other,

Engrossed in deep agony,

Shall witness endless raining alone,

As if the world is left with none else around

Futile are the embraces of those worldly bonds

Futile are the dins of the day

It is only for eyes to feel the bliss

In sipping nectar of beholding eyes 

And, souls to caress and feel each other,

While the rest evaporates into utter darkness.

Whom would it harm,

If I can shed bits of my pain?

Confined to a corner of the room amidst deep shower,

If I can convey me to her,; 

How does it concern anyone else?

In presence of overflowing stream of rain

And, occasional sparkles of lightening

It seems that those emotions,

Which have so long been lying

Secreted within the soul

Can be shared just in these moments,

Along such tempestuous streak of raining.

The original song of Tagore in Bengali:--

  

এমন দিনে তারে বলা যায়,

এমন ঘনঘোর বরিষায়।

এমন দিনে মন খোলা যায়

এমন মেঘস্বরে  বাদল-ঝরঝরে

তপনহীন ঘন তমসায়॥

সে কথা শুনিবে না কেহ আর,

নিভৃত নির্জন চারি ধার।

দুজনে মুখোমুখি  গভীর দুখে দুখি,

আকাশে জল ঝরে অনিবার

জগতে কেহ যেন নাহি আর॥

সমাজ সংসার মিছে সব,

মিছে এ জীবনের কলরব।

কেবল আঁখি দিয়ে   আঁখির সুধা পিয়ে

হৃদয় দিয়ে হৃদি অনুভব–

আঁধারে মিশে গেছে আর সব॥

তাহাতে এ জগতে ক্ষতি কার

নামাতে পারি যদি মনোভার।

শ্রাবণবরিষনে একদা গৃহকোণে

দু কথা বলি যদি কাছে তার

তাহাতে আসে যাবে কিবা কার॥

ব্যাকুল বেগে আজি বহে বায়,

বিজুলি থেকে থেকে চমকায়।

যে কথা এ জীবনে    

রহিয়া গেল মনে

সে কথা আজি যেন বলা যায়–

এমন ঘনঘোর বরিষায়॥

O sweet black bee !!

Poet Jasimuddin, born in British India in 1903, was one of the most renowned poets of Bengal. He is more often referred as the Pastoral Poet. He was a profoundly learned man and devoted his life to research on rural ballads and songs of Bengal apart from his marvellous work of literature. His contributions towards identifying the origins of rural songs of Bengal and collecting and archiving those in a very systematic manner have truly presented us a wonderful treasure of country songs in current era. 

He himself directed music to many of his country songs, which have not been only popular to Bengali audience but also its different versions were also very popular in Indian subcontinent.

I am always amazed by the sweetness of the song, "Nisithe Jaio phulobone". The poet himself was the music director of the song, which was subsequently used in other languages in India by legendary S D Burman, the poet's friend. Here I have tried to translate the song.

O cute black bee! Come to my garden in night;

Lighting the moonlight

I shall stay awake, and  

Converse with dews through night

O sweet black bee! Come to my garden tonight.



If I fall asleep

If I run into dreams

Then you walk quietly, dear,

O sweet black bee! Come to my garden tonight.



Keep my branches unbroken

Keep my flowers unhurt

Keep the slumbering flowers in peace

Keep the footsteps silent in your walk

O sweet black bee! Come to my garden tonight.

Is mod se jaate hain....

"Is mod se jaate hain" is another Gulzar poem, which carries intense feelings saturated with rich philosophy and I attempted its transliteration some two decades back and am uploading without any further editing to keep the emotions of my youth uninterrupted by an intrusion of my old mind now.....

This is the bend, where it leaves from;

The path tracing a few leisurely steps

The traveller pacing a few agile strides,

To a marble palace

To a glass house

To a nest of straw;

It reaches there from just this bend.

Gliding like a gale, the path sweeps past

Coyly slides down from some footstep;

Of those myriad flowing walkways

There must be one such path,

Which takes to your doorstep;

It is this bend where it leaves from.

From afar one comes

And flips once nearer,

And a solitary forlorn path

That neither treads nor pauses,

Amidst all random thoughts

I await, with a feeble trust,

There must be one such path,

Which takes to your doorstep;

It is just this bend, where it leaves from.

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)