Teesta Review: A Journal of Poetry, Volume 3, Number 1. May 2020. ISSN: 2581-7094
There Is Gairkata
Inside Kolkata Too
The
leaves of cauliflower are awake with dews of Tarai
The
sight thrills me from my head to toe
There
is Gairkata inside Kolkata too, one just cares to know.
The
sun is mellow, how the yellowish glow on the cauliflowers expands
As
if they are the hundreds of skulls of the people uprooted from their lands
And
drenched in sunlight and mysterious dews at dawn
Silent,
still, unbearably withdrawn
I
am also uprooted deeply from my village Gairkata
Taking
my skull in my skinny hand I'm begging to Kolkata
How
quiet is that green-filled Dhapa to
tolerate
As
if my small village, printed in letter press with deep shade
my
head bends down though I have much anger and discontent
Will
the sun of Dhapa be lost behind the malls and restaurants?
And
therefore I feel enthralled, what is this green around my skull? How is this
leafy petal?
White
Kolkata wakes up surrounding the landless skulls.
Waiting
for Asadh to arrive
How is the dusk? Slightly brown like the nipples
of river!
Or her mole beside her chest? Deep, black, alone?
I have made a farm inside the womb of river, where I
sleep peacefully
And watch a grey line of horizon becoming vermilion
River talks about the stars only, about the Icarus
far away
I listen silently, for my only companion is this
broken still silence today
We used to have a tumbling house of corals far off
That too have been broken by some pristine god of
unlove
Now there is no river, in the scattered pebbles my
bed
The sky is up, a crytal knife hangs over my head
I was given the night, so I cultivate the lands at
night
I sow the seeds in darkness, make a channel to
collect the rains
I see the moonlight come and go on the back of wild
hogs
The river has gone but every moonlit night I get
soaked by her
How is the dusk? Is it like the smooth back of the
river
Or is it the scarlet darkness aroused suddenly from
her womb?
Nothing has lasted among them, only the nocturnal
seedbed is there
Jaistha is almost finished, there is no rain, I have
been waiting for Ashadh.
Best
of Poetry
--- Bikash Sarkar
I have composed the best of my poetry this noon
Therefore I look at the definite blue through my
window
Many spirits roam there in the form of clouds and
vapour
In my house, I sit anxiously for my best poetry
I rush to the verandah, I take the umbrella from her
hand and say
‘Scorching heat, I see your face is sunburnt
Have some rest beneath the fan’
I wait, I wait only for her
She wounds her knee while learning to ride bicycle
And I feel her pain, her bleeding inside myself
I scold her, then kiss her dragging her close with my
hands
My daughter is now thirteen, she has grown old
Her friends come and call her in the dawn
My best of poetry will no more be stuck inside my
notebook
Forgive
me Blade
--- Bikash Sarkar
I’m no Guy de Maupassant
Son of Batakrishna Sarkar, I’m just an ordinary
Bengali man
Forgive me, blade
I can not try to kill myself
I have to live for a long time
I have to arrange for my sister’s marriage
I shall build a house, shall make my brother a
graduate
I haven’t yet read many writings of Marquez
Haven’t yet seen Kurosawa’s ‘Dreams’
Broken love? I don’t actually think about it
anymore
Good job? Stay
away
Hike in price? I
will live nonetheless
Jesus I will live nonetheless
And while being bitten by the yellowish blade of
fullmoon
I shall keep looking at the deep blue river
Thrashing
After my birth I got thrashed for the first time by
the wild hospital
The dirty corridors of the hospital, infectious
felines and unmarried nurse
The ill-tempered old teacher of primary school
thrashed me
My brain has been broken by the clever kicks of ABCD
and primers
I was thrashed by the map-books, the mysterious
borderlines and misleading histories
By a black spooky engine and continuous sound of
hammer
By cheap cigarettes and the artful symphony of the
nymphomaniacs
I was thrashed
by the blind affection of my parents
I was
thrashed severely by Tina Munim, by Asha Bhosle’s Rabindrasangeet
I was
thrashed by the shout of the void, by the white pages of diary,
by the haunted bank of Panga
Finally you, Kochi Mukherjee, have lifted your two
green breasts
You have removed your glasses and hold the
mysterious foggy cotton rose in your eyes
You are
thrashing me, the beliefs of the blinds are thrashing me
Where
the Butterfly Sleeps
I live where the butterfly sleeps
I cover my wings with the veil of darkness
Centipedes, worms, snakes all are acute light-eaters
in this city
In this city, the heart is covered with mushy grey
matter
My wings are wet with dews, I can fly no more
Just trying to dry those broken wet wings in the sun
But in vein, Chitragriva jumps and breaks my bone
This city makes me a cerebral light-eater
Kanishka’s
Head
When both of us are about to start an endless love
story,
Kanishka’s
head floated above in the
Darkness
Like bubbles, sharp radiation of moonlight from his
eyes
I grabbed her hands, delighted
She grabbed my hands in fear
The haunted field and its soul drowned in a
supernatural atmosphere
My left arm freezed with the touch of her soft
breast
The skeleton of the wind granulated with the touch
of
thighs and lips
Her hands rang upon my hand, aloud
At one point, she sank into the darkness
Only Kanishka’s head remained
Sharp
radiation of moonlight from his eyes
Give
Me Back My Words
I open up some words easily and want to scatter them
to the clouds
Some words I keep shut, as the moon remains silent
during the day
With bottle green jungle on both sides, I walk
alone, aimlessly
Tea gardens on both sides, I roam like an odd airy
ghost
I talk with the thin tuberose, I speak of some love
I pick out the burrs from jeans and free many
sorrow-songs
I too am green, Dandakalas knows this, all the
grasses and Thankuni also
I too am yellow, for so many times I have burnt in
the sun near the Earls
The dense and quivering night is moving like the
snake hood, words
I want all the words from the cosmos, directed to
the stars
Tuberose, give me back my conversations with Kochi
Burr, give me back all the words of Ricky Majumdar
Rain-filled cloud, foggy mustard field, haunted
Aamlaki garden
I want back all the words opened up to them all
As if my hanging haunted shadow wants me back
I
Am Forgetting
I am forgetting my mother
Mother’s
pure face
I am forgetting my father
Father’s
strong muscle
Only a knife, it’s open, calling inaudibly
From a rotten pond
It’s calling continuously from between a huff
The polluted room, burnt hill, two skillful breasts
are calling
The pin awoke on the bed
Love letters scattered on the floor, torm
manuscripts
Call
me and call me today
I am forgetting myself, my own face
Magic-realism
The train went by, with a sack of rice on her waist
Madhu didima is
coming back…
At that time, a leaf fell, a flower was born
A water-snake floated parallel to the Water Lily
A soft sunlight fell upon the Croton plant
Crossing the British Pool, the sun was going to
Anandanagar
Wearing white cloth like melancholy, between the
lands
Madhu didima is coming back
There is nothing in her heart except the sack of
rice.
(Translated from Bengali into English by
Suparna Mondal)