# On Either Side of the Bridge <p>সাঁকোর এপ্রান্তে বসে একজন অপেক্ষা করছে, আর ওপ্রান্তে দাঁড়িয়ে আরেকজন। তাদের মধ্যে বিস্তৃত শুধু সাঁকোর দৈর্ঘ্য নয়, এক অপরিমেয় দূরত্ব।</p> On one side of the bridge sits someone waiting, and on the other stands another. Between them stretches not merely the length of the bridge, but an immeasurable distance. <p>যারা সেতু পার হয়েছে তারা জানে, পার হওয়ার সময় কোনো মুহূর্তে আপনি আর যেখান থেকে এসেছেন তার অংশ থাকেন না, এবং এখনো যেখানে যাচ্ছেন তারও অংশ হন না। সাঁকোর মাঝামাঝি একটি অবস্থান আছে যেখানে আপনি কোথাও নন।</p> Those who have crossed a bridge know that in the crossing, there comes a moment when you no longer belong to where you have come from, and you are not yet part of where you are going. At the midpoint of the bridge lies a place where you exist nowhere. <p>এপ্রান্তের অপেক্ষমান মানুষটি চিন্তা করে, যে যাবে তার জন্য অপেক্ষা করা হয়েছে কি না। এবং ওপ্রান্তের মানুষটি ভাবে, যে আসবে তার জন্য স্বাগত প্রস্তুত করা হয়েছে কি না।</p> The person waiting on this side wonders whether the one who will leave has truly been expected. And the one on the other side ponders whether the one who will arrive has been welcomed. <p>কখনো কখনো দুজনে একই সাথে সাঁকোতে দাঁড়ায়। তখন তারা এক অদ্ভুত মুহূর্তের মুখোমুখি হয় — যেখানে উভয়ে উভয়কে দেখতে পায়, কিন্তু একজনকে অতিক্রম করতে হলে অপরজনকে ঠেলে দিয়ে যেতে হয়। অনেকেই সেই মুহূর্তে থেমে যায়, অপরজনের দিকে এগিয়ে যেতে ভয় পায়। কারণ এগিয়ে যাওয়ার মানে পরিবর্তন, আর পরিবর্তনের মানে হারানো।</p> Sometimes two people stand on the bridge at once. Then they face a strange moment—where both can see each other, but to pass the other, one must push forward. Many hesitate at that instant, afraid to advance toward the other. For to move forward means to change, and to change means to lose. <p>সাঁকোগুলি আসলে গন্তব্য নয়, সেগুলি সংযোগ। কিন্তু প্রতিটি সংযোগে লুকানো থাকে একটি বিচ্ছেদ। যখন আপনি এক পার থেকে অন্য পারে পৌঁছান, আপনি যা ছেড়ে এসেছেন তা চিরকালের জন্য পিছনে পড়ে থাকে, এমনকি যদি আপনি ফিরে যান তবুও।</p> Bridges are not destinations; they are connections. But hidden in every connection lies a separation. When you reach from one side to the other, what you have left behind remains forever behind, even if you were to return. <p>তাই এপ্রান্তে যারা অপেক্ষা করে এবং ওপ্রান্তে যারা প্রত্যাশা করে, তারা আসলে একই অভিজ্ঞতা ভাগ করে নেয় — অপরিবর্তনীয়তার ভয়। শুধুমাত্র তাদের অপেক্ষার দিক ভিন্ন।</p> So those who wait on this side and those who expect on the other share the same experience—the fear of the irreversible. Only their directions of waiting differ. <p>এবং সাঁকো, এই নিরপেক্ষ স্থান, চুপচাপ দাঁড়িয়ে থাকে তাদের মধ্যে, প্রতিটি পদক্ষেপের সাক্ষী, প্রতিটি দ্বিধার সাক্ষী, প্রতিটি স্বতন্ত্র মুহূর্তের সাক্ষী।</p> And the bridge, this neutral place, stands quietly between them—witness to every step, to every hesitation, to every solitary moment.

1. She loves you, but you do not love her. So much so that you need not measure the depth of her love—her very existence becomes a torment to you! In such cases, the shallower the love, the deeper the pain.

2. You love someone who does not love you back. Try as you might, you never catch their eye; they simply looked away, looked through you. Do not grieve—most love stories, truth be told, go something like this.

3. Your own person loves another right before your eyes. You wail and protest for a day or two, then accept it all in silence. What else can you do? Then you console yourself: "At least they are still here, within my sight! At least I kept them from going to the one they love!" In time you will see that neither of you loves the other, yet you remain together—and perhaps always will. This is the world's law, the dharma of the household, the fate of life! It is really helplessness, the punishment of having to live by custom and convention.

4. Two people love each other madly, yet hide it away. If only we could speak our hearts as freely as we did in childhood! Growing up has one terrible cost: you cannot tell just anyone what your heart holds.

5. You were meant to rest your head on one shoulder, yet you share a bed with another. You were never meant to marry this person, and yet you maintain a household with them! Yes, this is what life is. Life is such a strange place—you can spend day after day beside someone without loving them, bound by some spell or mere habit.

6. The girl you fell in love with—you once yearned to be the father of her bright, beautiful child. Yet she has gone into another man's home. She has borne two daughters, but their father is someone else. And still you sit and plan: if you have a daughter, you'll give her a name woven together with hers!

7. The dream you two once imagined fulfilling together—both of you—when that dream comes to mind on some lazy afternoon, you still laugh alone, yet that dream itself no longer lives.

8. You two were meant to meet again... forget it! Both of you deliberately take the same road, wanting to forget, wanting not to be seen by each other—but alas, the meeting does not happen!

9. You both want to flee from each other, neither wants to be seen—yet you meet! Your mind is full of so many things unsaid, but when you do meet, none of it remains. Not a word comes to mind.

10. No one is with anyone, and never will be. Yet there is something—a pull, a fierce sensation. This invisible bond intoxicates them both, drowns them in deep regret. There is no explanation for it, no logic! Perhaps no meaning at all.

11. In this life you have sworn that in the next, you will make no more sacrifices. You will love each other in that life—you will remain together, loving. How long can one live without love! Since you could not stay together in this life even with your love, you console yourselves with this thought: perhaps in the next life... But apart from literature, does the next life even exist?