Thought: One Hundred and Six.
……………………..
Don’t answer, I’m not writing to you for answers. I write to lighten my own heart. So often I write so many things. Not one of them ever reaches you. I think deeply,
all the laughter in my life,
all the joy,
I’ll give it all to you. Let the sorrow remain mine alone. If I give you even that little bit, what would I have left to call my own, tell me?
None of my letters will ever go to your door, none of my words will ever burn in your fire,
all my language will only burn in the heat of my own emotions. All the calculations on the pages of life’s ledger, all the tears and laughter, all the giving and taking,
I’ll manage all of it alone. I’ve already spent so much time lost in thoughts of you. And how many more days will I live,
tell me? I’ll carefully tend to my emotions and affections surrounding you for however many days remain. What else can be done, tell me?
There’s only one life. How much can one life give? You’ve already given so much. The pile of what I’ve received towers far higher than the pile of what I’ve lost. I’m content,
I have no complaints. Does life really run on the ledger of transactions,
tell me? Whatever has obstructed my life,
whatever has tried to bind me,
whatever has tried to hide you from my life,
how many times I’ve casually let go of so much!
Let others not know,
but you know. I’ve allowed myself to move forward constantly. Whatever is good in you, I keep all of it alive within my chest. In my life, only when it comes to you, however many times obstacles have come,
however powerful they may be,
I’ve resisted them with everything I have and carefully sheltered that goodness of yours within my heart. To keep you alive I’ve given up countless friends! I who had not a single enemy,
today that same me faces so much slander in so many mouths!
The threads of trust-encircled relationships have broken, bonds have come undone in moments of pride. You’ll never know the address of those stories.
How I love you,
how much I love you,
you know very well!
That place of love will always remain. Always and forever. The soul is never destroyed, and this love of mine will never be destroyed either!
You said I attack you badly in my posts,
that’s not right. That my presence is disturbing your peace,
there can be no more terrible accusation than this. You’re saying all this because you’re hurt,
I know that too. I’m under tremendous pressure. That’s perhaps why this has been happening lately. Without understanding, I subconsciously say such things to you. Even to hold a person’s pain requires a basket. That basket needs great care, great trust, great peace, great comfort, great tenderness. Thinking of you as that basket, I had placed a few handfuls of all my pain there. I didn’t realize you would be hurt so much. How close you are to me, how much my own, how dear, you know that, don’t you?
When I share my pain with you,
I feel a little happiness, and if you don’t understand this and feel hurt thinking it’s an attack, then to whom else will I express my anguish, tell me?
How does one who has no one to express their pain to survive, tell me?
Don’t misunderstand me. You too are under a lot of pressure, and have been lately, I can see that very clearly. Your temper doesn’t always stay cool either. Don’t I understand that, tell me? Don’t torment yourself needlessly. Since yesterday my heart has been heavy. I’ve cried a lot—not because I was hurt, but because I hurt you. Last night I read the poem you wrote. In my mind I heard it in your voice, your words, your intonation. I don’t dare hope for more than this. Once you used to write poems and recite them to me. Do you remember? You’d say, see if this is right? The threading of words, the arrangement of rhythm? You said you’d change it. Without reciting to me, your rhythms wouldn’t fall into place. I know now your poems find their rhythms perfectly well without me. I am no longer your poetry. Your poetry and I are no longer one. I’ve accepted this. Life teaches us to accept everything. That’s why I’m saying, I beseech you, just don’t misunderstand. Even if you don’t understand me, still don’t misunderstand.
I love you deeply, you know that. When you suffer for any reason, it’s as if someone presses a sharp knife hard against my heart. All the tears in the world ball up and lodge near my throat, hardening there, spreading pain. Monsoons descend at the corners of my eyes. I always pray that whatever you want, however you want it, however much you want—may that be yours for your entire life! I know you want what’s good for me. Whatever you may say, I believe you are my sincere well-wisher, friend, the person of my soul. You never need to tell me this. I understand, I know it in my feelings. You too know that I know this. I have so much affection and boundless love for you. May God keep you well, even in exchange for my life.
Let me play a little with you, shall I?
In the sky a plateful of white moon spreads soft light……
Look, all this love in my heart someday—
I’ll give it to that moon!
Unable to bear the weight of my mountain-high love,
The moon will then—
Fall down with a thud…….right on your head!
Reflection: One hundred seven.
……………………..
Coming out of Concord, Nairrita really wanted to walk with her all the way to Aziz Super Market. But she couldn’t. Because she could no longer keep up the act of staying normal. Inside her chest, a humiliation kept striking repeatedly: “Why are you following me like this? Even dogs don’t follow this much!” To say something so simple in such a harsh way! Her voice didn’t tremble even a little! How easily the old ‘tumi’ becomes ‘apni’!
Only when alone,
does Noirita return to herself. When she’s in front of Animesh, her mind doesn’t work quite right. She sees Borun’s shadow. Again and again she feels
that Borun is looking straight into her eyes and speaking. It hurts terribly to compose herself and speak with him,
to listen to his words. She
keeps thinking,
why does everyone leave her behind?
Was she born only to suffer? What fault was hers? Lost in these thoughts, she starts walking down the road ahead. Just walking and walking. “Even dogs don’t follow this much!” How can people say such things? Noirita wonders—could
she herself ever hurt even a stranger with such cruel words? Suddenly hearing birds chirping, Noirita stops in front of a cage. Oh!
She’s reached Kantabon! Looking at the birds, Noirita felt—why are these birds in this cage?
They should have been in the sky!
Didn’t Borun free them long ago?
A little distance from where she stands, Ojit is walking by. He doesn’t even look back once. People like Ojit just walk past, sidestepping everything. Why isn’t Borun here at this place, at this time? Why doesn’t he
return from the sky? Or is
the path back from there closed? Only Borun understood her a little. Even this small happiness God couldn’t bear!
Noirita’s heavy heart grew even heavier. Sensing this, Borun must surely be saying from that distant sky,
“You silly girl! Does anyone stay sad like this? Look, I’m here!
Smile, now smile!”
Drawing a smile at the corners of her lips, Noirita gives a high-five to a star in the sky. Then
she starts walking again. Those melancholy-sweet memories from within the four walls just a while ago are gradually becoming past, and Noirita touches them gently as she passes. In the density of salt water, Noirita keeps getting stuck,
only her two feet keep moving.
Suddenly seeing an empty rickshaw, she asked the fare for her destination and got the reply,
“180 taka.”
“What?
180 taka?
What do you mean?
Do you know anything about fares?”
Shouting this and looking around, Noirita came to her senses; she realized
how far she had wandered in the wrong direction while walking absent-mindedly!
“Let’s go, uncle.”
Getting into the rickshaw, Noirita asks herself—
why is there no rickshaw to reach life’s right destination?
Let it charge a bit more fare!
The rickshaw rushes toward its destination.
Thought: One hundred eight.
……………………..
Well, washroom delays can happen, but this much?
How strange! Who likes sitting alone like this? They’ve given me enough time to finish one cup of coffee. Hmph! In this amount of time, one could finish ten mugs of coffee and even take a nap!
What’s taking so long in the washroom? Does he have the same obsession with cleanliness that I do!?
I don’t think so. Besides, whatever needed to
“come out”
has already come out! Why spend so much time on it then? Or maybe
he got the big one,
that’s why the delay? Oh no,
why did the big one have to come at this romantic moment? The big bathroom call? Why did you have to come now?
Do you know who I am? I’ll absolutely kill you and make you disappear!
Why is nature’s cruel beckoning interfering with my beautiful time? Actually,
I’m nobody. Even his big bathroom knows that.
Damn! Nothing feels right! Wait,
is the gentleman standing in the washroom chatting with Sumita again?
That wicked girl had pinged on Viber just a while ago. Right after that he got his bathroom urge! Smells
fishy! “Good. And you?”
Why did Sumita send that?
Does that mean he
texted Sumita first?
While I’m thinking, my internal enemy, my dual self, appears! Why, Nishi?
Let him talk to Sumita,
let him talk to whoever he wants, what’s it to you? Burning with jealousy, are you?
Why so much envy?
Don’t you dare chatter,
dual self! It won’t end well!
I told you, am I burning?
And even if I am, what’s it to you?
And why shouldn’t I burn?
The time that’s set aside for me—during that time I absolutely will not tolerate anyone else’s share. Huuuuuuu……
Why do you act like this? He
may have chatted a bit with Sumita,
but he’s not doing anything else!
Don’t come to me with the sound of swatting flies amidst the roar of bombs, understand?
I know everything, nothing is unknown to me. The depth and breadth of it all—I know it all, I understand it. No matter how much you try to convince me, little will be heard. Don’t waste your effort trying to console me. Go,
do your own work,
and give me freedom.
The dual self stopped bothering me. My time here isn’t passing, while real time seems to be racing at the speed of light. Let the bastard come out of the bathroom! I’ll squeeze his stomach so hard he’ll get another ‘big one’! Hummm…!
Ugh! How much of our ‘time together’
is slipping away. Why isn’t he coming yet? What’s so pleasurable about staying in the bathroom?
Thinking all this, Nishi’s mood sours. Finally, exhausted,
to pass the time she picks up a book and starts reading.
Thought: One hundred and nine.
……………………..
My love is false, all my feelings are false, the tears of countless daily moments are false. If these weren’t false, then you would understand my feelings exactly. You could never treat me ‘this way’ so terribly, so continuously, for so long—never! What you’re thinking now—what is this ‘this way’?
Perhaps because my love is false, you can’t understand, or maybe you understand perfectly. What blame is yours, tell me? I myself could never truly love you. How can I stay beside you, depending on a love that is false? It would be better to leave, wouldn’t it? How easy it is to leave!
I still haven’t learned this simple task. You’ve never given me even a drop of hope for staying by your side, or in the faith that you’d keep me beside you. I survive only by depending on my own love. But if even that love is false, then how do I live, tell me!
Every moment these false feelings keep me so overwhelmed and restless, and I live thinking them true? What terrible injustice is this?
How much longer can this be allowed?…So I’m leaving today. Some departures mean—what terrible staying behind!
In silence, far too much silence. If by releasing hands one could release the heart, how happily one could live!
Just as eyes waste away from looking at you, if only old memories could waste away the same way!
Why do I remember? Why do things remain in mind that only cause pain? When even the last oil in the lamp is exhausted, on what hope do I still kindle light with the blood of my heart? When one of two banks no longer exists, on what hope do I gaze unblinking at the bridge and dream?
Why does one whose fate is to dwell in darkness still wake dreaming of dawn’s light?
I cannot go, yet I will go. However I may be, you stay well.
Do you know how much pain I’ll have?
This—that you can’t understand at all, or don’t want to think about exactly how much pain I’ll have—this means that even this pain inside my chest is false. If it were true, surely you would understand. People even look once when the household dog or cat suffers, don’t they? I don’t even have that fortune! I know I have no place in your heart. But that doesn’t mean you’re unaware of my pain. You stay well precisely when I’m in pain, don’t you? My pain, your joy. The one who is dear to me—only my pain is dear to them. Such is my fate! So I wonder, what I’m receiving—is it pain at all?
If it were, then why wouldn’t you know when I’m in pain? If you couldn’t know that I’m suffering, then you too should feel pain!
The accounts don’t add up!
Should I then assume that actually I’m not in pain?
Is all this merely my imagination of pain?
You know, I knew that tears never lie. Yet look—forgetting all the humiliation, contempt, and scorn, the water in which my entire self would soak day after day, seeking solace from my own self, even that most intimate salt water has betrayed me like this?
One who has no one to offer comfort is truly wretched. I cannot even tell anyone about my pain. I have learned to settle accounts with myself, by myself.
My heart has become foreign to me, my tears too have become foreign—none of them listen to me anymore. I have nothing left to call my own. I am utterly alone now. What do I live for, tell me?
Still, I will go on living. People do live on…….
Thought: One hundred ten.
……………………..
Saleha, didn’t you bring the Mughlai bread?
No, Mother, I forgot.
When there’s no Mughlai, you should have brought regular bread.
I didn’t say “there wasn’t any,” I said “I forgot.”
That’s exactly why I’m saying—when there’s no Mughlai, you could have brought regular bread, I would have made sandwiches.
How strange! If I had remembered, I would have brought the Mughlai bread! (shouting)
Then do one thing—bring puris. Don’t they have puris at the hotel either?
Shouldn’t someone pick up such awful mothers and give them a good shake? She goes after me for no reason at all!
Of course, if Mother didn’t go after me, how would I survive? Ever since Father died, I’ve been receiving this sweet torment. If she doesn’t go after me, who else would the poor woman go after? If Mother ever stopped giving me this pain, from whom would I seek torment?
Neither of us has anyone. Mother’s beloved has been lost; my beloved hasn’t come yet, afraid of being lost!
Thought: One hundred eleven.
…………………………..
You know, if I had lots of money, I would take you on a helicopter ride someday. I’d rent a chopper for a long while and tour as much of the country as possible from above. But what can I do, tell me! I might have enough money to rent a helicopter, but I don’t have the kind of money that would let me rent one and enjoy such luxury.
If I had lots of money, oh what joy that would be! We two would roam about in the helicopter, and I’d hold your hands constantly! Between glimpses of everything below, we’d sip a little—you coffee and I tea—read a few lines from correspondence together, and even write a four-line poem about that moment’s feeling! Then on your hand, I mean… on your hand I’d plant a firm, strong bite to make sure that everything happening is real, not some fantasy. But then you mustn’t pull your hand away with that terrifying jerk like you did that day, all right?
And this means, if I feel like doing anything else, I’ll just go ahead and do that too!
(Even if I feel like using the toilet, I’ll just dash off and use it! Don’t they build toilets in choppers if you ask them to?)
Wait, do helicopters have rearview mirrors like CNGs? If that pilot bastard sitting in the cockpit keeps staring at the mirror and causes any kind of trouble, I’ll grab him and shove him right out!
Whatever happens after that, happens,
but I’ll definitely throw him out! If needed, I’ll Google how to fly helicopters and learn it, and the two of us will pilot the chopper together.
Wouldn’t that be amazing?
Oh my! Will such a day ever come?
Thought: One hundred and twelve.
…………………………..
Day by day,
the gradual growing up from that tiny self—isn’t it a rather strange thing?
We remain exactly the same every day—yesterday’s me,
today’s me,
tomorrow’s me—all these versions of me look exactly alike. No one could ever say that I was small yesterday,
I’ve grown big today,
or that I’m small today but will be big tomorrow;
yet this strange daily unchangingness is what carries us from birth all the way to death! So unchangingness too carries us along? What a marvelous thing, isn’t it?
Every second, the me that stays with me deceives me so terribly!
When I suddenly
grow up,
I don’t even realize it! A silent, subtle change keeps happening within us constantly, hidden from our very eyes!
I just remembered a twist about growing up from small to big. My sister and I both used to climb into Abbu’s lap a lot, wherever Abbu went,
we went there too, even to Abbu’s office!
In the bitter cold,
even when Abbu had night duty, we two sisters would go along! Abbu was in T&T; much of our childhood was spent inside the first dome of the red building opposite Bijoy Sarani near the Parliament building. Many people didn’t even know Abbu,
but they certainly knew us!
When Abbu had work, we would wander around the Parliament area by ourselves
(we roamed inside),
and whenever Abbu was free, we’d roam around riding in his lap. There used to be quite a quarrel between us two sisters over who would get to sit in Abbu’s lap first.
Once we went to visit the village. Walking with Abbu, we had gone somewhere quite far, I don’t remember where—it was night by the time we returned. In those days, evening in the village meant deep night. All around, crickets were shrieking loudly. That a creature called a cricket could scream with such a piercing sound,
little me had no idea;
now though I find it deeply pleasant, often late at night I become intoxicated by the imaginary calls of crickets. Little me was very frightened of those insects that day. We were walking along the railway tracks,
nothing but fields on both sides, no one anywhere,
only the crickets doing their night duty. In fear, I was shrinking inside,
but I didn’t tell Abbu at all. Even as a very small child, I used to keep many things bottled up inside,
not wanting to tell anyone anything that might cause Abbu or other family members pain
or worry.
As I was saying… gripping Abbu’s finger, I was walking swiftly through the darkness along that ghostly rural railway line, suppressing the tremendous fear within me. Alas!
And then came the torrential rain! Rain, I mean—a thunderous downpour!
I was already shrinking with fear,
and when the rain came, whatever little moisture was left in my throat,
it seemed to suck away even that!
Even in that childhood, I had understood—
alas, rain doesn’t only give water, sometimes it takes away too! It takes so much that it leaves you utterly parched! By then we had reached near a bridge;
it couldn’t really be called a bridge, rather, it was the railway line’s arrangement high above the water. Oh my God! The space between the two railway sleepers was completely hollow!
In the sudden flashes of lightning from the sky, one could see the deep water below,
with nothing to hold onto on either side! People cross over this!?
How unbearably terrifying that moment felt to little me—
as I write this very moment, I can deeply feel that exact moment again, fear making the hair on my body stand on end!
How strange are the sensations of human life, isn’t it!? Which class I was in,
I can’t quite remember—
it must have been third or fourth perhaps.
Anyway,
as I was saying… all this while I had been walking holding Abbu’s hand,
but when we were to cross that terrifying bridge, Abbu lifted me into his arms. I was crossing the bridge in Abbu’s embrace,
in the lightning’s flash I could see Abbu’s feet and the play of deep water below between the railway sleepers, and I was staring toward it in absolute terror! What a thunderous downpour it was,
we were crossing the bridge… I felt tremendous anguish for Abbu, thinking repeatedly
that any moment we might both slip and fall through the railway gaps into the depths below. Lost in these chaotic thoughts as we crossed,
suddenly I began to feel strangely out of place in this so-familiar embrace! As if I had suddenly grown from small to quite big,
or as if I realized I was growing up. I no longer seemed to fit properly in his arms,
my time of being carried was over, I had grown up. That feeling was gradually overwhelming me,
I felt like crying out and asking,
why am I growing up? Why won’t I be able to ride in Abbu’s arms anymore? I don’t want to grow up,
I want to ride in Abbu’s arms! After some more time, I suddenly began to feel deeply ashamed—
was I feeling this way because I was being carried after so long? In deep contemplation I was thinking all this, my surroundings completely invisible, I could see nothing,
hear nothing, I was absorbed only in my thoughts.
By then Abbu had almost reached the inhabited area,
and the rain had stopped too. When Abbu set me down from his arms, my reverie was broken. My goodness, when had we crossed the bridge, and I had been sitting in Abbu’s embrace all this time? Thinking of how much difficulty Abbu must have faced walking such a distance in the rain carrying me,
my heart grew heavy.
I don’t remember if I ever rode in Abbu’s arms again after that.