Reflection: Eighty-Five.
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Today two paths diverged
My dream-seen princess dwells
This is merely a day of songs
If this path never ends
This honeyed night
On this very shore of the Yamuna
This night is yours and mine
In this beautiful golden evening
Who are you calling me
What rainbow lives in my song
Drowsy, drowsy moon
I know not when it will end
You who are mine
Stay close, if you will
A small nest, no harm
Now, in my adulthood, watching Suchitra, I understand why Mother used to sing these songs to Father in my childhood. When little me appeared before them, the song would change, turning into a gentle hum. Ha ha ha……
So many such songs feel deeply close to me. Who doesn’t feel drawn to their mother’s favorite songs! From the moment a person learns to listen, the songs they hear repeatedly become beloved for life. And the songs that parents or loved ones hum before a small child merge with their consciousness—they can feel both the words and melodies of those songs. The quality my father used to speak of about Mother (and still does) was this: dignified yet romantic. I wonder—isn’t Suchitra like that too? Could it be that Father found joy imagining Suchitra or someone similar in Mother?
I spent the entire weekend evening on YouTube with Suchitra. Every moment spent with Suchitra touches me deeply!
Happiness is…….. when the magic of Suchitra’s eyes plays upon Roma’s lips.
When Suchitra was Roma, or had just become Suchitra, there was a slight typical East Bengali accent in her pronunciation. Sukumar Dasgupta, director of her first released film *Saat Number Koyedi*, had asked the future legend to read Saratchandra’s play *Bindur Chhele* to improve herself. She was told that her pronunciation had the problem of Pabna’s regional accent—that unless she learned to speak in standard pronunciation, she wouldn’t get more acting opportunities…….. Can you believe it? Even a Suchitra had to hear such words!
Why did I say this? Those of us who think we’ll correct many of our flaws are not thinking wrongly at all. To live the life of our dreams, we certainly need to change ourselves. Why? Because the life we dream of is something that is not ours at this moment. So, to live that life, we must become something that we are not at this moment. For some, this transformation happens sooner; for others, later. But this doesn’t mean anyone is lagging behind anyone else. Those who have faith in Suchitra Sen’s perfection, let us shake off our rage at our own imperfections right now. It’s possible that I am nothing right now. But does that mean I will never become anything? By the age when Suchitra learned to speak in pure, standard pronunciation, many girls of that age had already become accomplished reciters, enchanting everyone with the magic of their words. But could any of them even come close to Suchitra? If you start something at which others are far ahead of you, and if you pursue it with proper dedication, you might advance so far that they won’t even be able to dream of touching you. Just make a beginning and see what happens!
In his early life, Kailash Kher was once humiliated and rejected when he wanted to sing at a wedding ceremony, and he returned home dejected. That day, despite much pleading, he wasn’t even allowed to step on stage once. But did that make him disappear? Now, would it even be possible to get him to sing at a wedding ceremony, even if you begged him on bended knee?
Life is like this. A day will come when you’ll look back at those bygone days and laugh, saying, “So I was there too!”
Thought: Eighty-six.
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That my beloved taught me to love — that’s not the remarkable thing; what’s remarkable is that such love can be taught even without being a beloved. Someone who isn’t truly a beloved, who merely stays beside you for a while, can at most be thought of as a companion or friend. To mistake them for a beloved — that’s where the trouble begins! And if, to survive that very delusion, that person teaches you, keeps teaching you relentlessly, suddenly becomes someone I once knew — is it even possible to accept that? Life is so strange, how much it teaches us to accept! If you believe every word of your dear one, sometimes even the matter of being well can turn into nostalgia at some point — before I understood this, she had already taught me to love. Why I fell in love with her is as difficult to explain as why I still love her today. When I secretly visit her profile to see how she’s doing, if she’s feeling sad, my heart still weeps like before; if she takes a picture standing next to some boy, I sit down with a measuring tape to calculate the distance of their positioning — perhaps none of this makes any sense. That everyone’s life must move forward in some meaning or other — what meaning does this have either? If I could hate her, it would be convenient because I could explain why I hate; yet I can never explain why I love. Why do people love this love, who knows? There’s no reason, no logic, no meaning. Love is such a worthless thing. Alas! This very worthless thing pulls life — forward, backward too. Without this pull, life seems to have no meaning at all. Love is like that. She thought it was a game. When the game ended, she’d break it off. That’s it! Finished! I still think that was life itself. If life itself doesn’t exist, then what’s the point of living just to carry around one’s own corpse? This very misunderstanding created the distance. In the love story of the jackfruit leaf and the lump of clay, they had an understanding — when rain comes, the jackfruit leaf will shelter the clay lump, and when storms rise, the clay lump will hold down the jackfruit leaf. What irony of fate! One day storm and rain came together. After that, everything ended. This is what happens. I mean, it’s predictable. But alas! This also happens — a goat comes and eats the jackfruit leaf, and a potter comes and shapes the clay lump into a pot. Whose harvest goes to whose home! What ironic defeat of life before livelihood! And love’s too. My busy beloved, while hurrying out of the house, tramples over my poetry manuscripts and goes off to arrange another person’s dreams; those poems lie face-down behind, the very poems about which she had told me life would be like them. How people make promises, break promises, silence all words, and slip away before words even run out! While playing with others’ light, pushing one’s own person into darkness — the form of the beloved that floats before the eyes makes even a gentle, proud soul like Jibanananda cry out: the girl who seemed like a tender dove just moments ago now seems like a rough hen. . . . . . . . Alas! Fool that I am, I can’t even think that! I keep the once-tender dove as a tender dove in my life forever. In the movie “Life is Beautiful,” even in the moments before the soldiers killed the father, didn’t that father’s natural gesture of taking life simply — convincing his son that even death is a game — doesn’t that gesture render meaningless all the pointless arrangements of arranging life while excluding life itself?
Playing at life’s game with abandon, then in the very next moment embracing death with the ease of sport while acting at being alive! Growing accustomed to such theatrical art! How much more can one accept in this single lifetime? How much suffering must one endure before life truly becomes life? How much anguish must one bear with a smile before one can call life by its name?
Thought: Eighty-seven.
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Tell me, when your touch-screen phone rings now, do you still slide to answer with that gentle touch like before? Have you deleted all those photos of me you used to love? Whose picture graces your background now? That ringtone in my cracked voice—”Hey darling, heyyy… pick up the phone…”—it’s gone, I know; did you delete the audio file? Or did you do that ages ago! When friends see me and say, “Oh, how handsome!” it probably just annoys you now, doesn’t it? Can someone like me really be beautiful? Do you ever accidentally visit my profile anymore? Do you still find joy in staring at those pictures for hours on end, motionless as before? The call you used to wait for restlessly, staring at your phone with such intensity, unlocking the screen again and again to check if you’d missed it—who makes that call now? Whose call records do you touch repeatedly in your call list? You don’t need to keep track of how long I’m active on messenger anymore, do you? Who gets that saved time? You taught someone like me to feel jealous, and you won’t let me forget it! Does this new person want to see you moment by moment like I did? Ask you to send selfies? Get upset when you don’t? Do they also talk about that dimple on your cheek? Or haven’t they noticed it yet? Have you two already had your first fight? When you’re angry, do you still ignore phone calls and leave them hanging? Do you still pout when someone doesn’t call three times in a row? Or have you raised that number? Does your lower lip still curl when you sulk? Have you grown comfortable with exchanging kisses over the phone? Who asks if you’ve eaten now? Or have you learned to eat without anyone asking? Does anyone get upset when you shower in the evening? Who do you think of when you remember to eat? Who calls early in the morning to wake you up? Can you catch your first class properly now? No one forbids you from cutting your hair anymore, right? Who breathes in the scent of your hair against their chest? Who meets your eyes like I used to? Do you still wear that blue sari? For whom? Does anyone ask you to wear that red bindi? Who do you peek at over your lowered glasses? Who listens patiently to all your false complaints today? On whom do you vent your anger with friends now? You need someone to vent anger on in this world, don’t you? When aunt scolds you, doesn’t it hurt anymore? When afternoon slowly slips into evening, do you still gaze at that scorched road in front of your house? When dusk falls, who wants to hear Rabindranath in your melodious voice? Who corrects the meter in your poems? Or do your poems no longer lose their rhythm? Whose company do you seek for all-night conversations when you feel like it? To whom do you hum songs at night? Whose phone do you snatch and threaten to smash now? When you feel like writing letters, to whom do you write? Do they patiently read such long, enchanting letters? Will you truly, one day, settle into domestic life with someone else? Can you really do it? What will I do then, tell me? Will feelings change hands so easily? Has the illness of heartbreak suddenly healed? Who cheers you up now? Are you slowly learning to dislike the songs and poems I loved? When someone praises my writing, you don’t light up with joy anymore, do you? Have you found someone new to appreciate your strangely beautiful paintings? How did you find them so easily? With whom do you share your sulks now?
Do you still cry with pursed lips, sobbing softly? To whom have you given away the art of consoling you, of making you understand and grow calm?
……….. I’m deeply curious to know.
Are you laughing? Go ahead and laugh, laugh heartily! Is everyone born only to weep? Life teaches some people to laugh as well.
Thought: Eighty-eight.
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Lose your temper, and you lose the game.
To let someone’s words make you angry means you’ve handed over control of yourself to another person.
When you get angry, it’s you who suffers the most harm.
It’s my own mind—if I don’t want to be angry, why should it rage?
Brother, understand this, now stop. That’s quite enough. Let there be harm, no matter! Only wily devils can manage to smile and say “Thank you sir! Have a good day!!” even when their face contorts in pain from two kicks to the rear. This world is neither a destiny company nor an insurance company.
I can’t do it! I won’t play that game! I’ll get angry, I’ll lose. My anger will subside, I’ll win. I’ll get angry again, I’ll lose. My anger will subside, I’ll win. See if that works out? If it doesn’t work, then run away, dance!
When I get angry, I never show it; I never let the person I’m angry with understand anything. I become completely silent. I suffer silently inside with suppressed hurt. I’m an extremely sensitive creature. There’s a kind of pleasure in suffering silently within. Oh! What am I saying! It’s my own loss! I know that. Still, somehow suffering feels sweetly satisfying. Even without speaking harsh words, just by looking at me you can tell that in that moment my love for you has diminished. Even someone I don’t like, I’ll have to say I like them—there’s still no such shortage of people to love in this world. How people become ugly when they’re angry—it just doesn’t enter my head! Then what’s the point of getting angry? When I’m angry, I want to grab people and throttle them. I start thinking all the joy in this world lies in throttling!
My experience tells me that most angry people have clear hearts. They have less hypocrisy in them. They cause less harm to others. They try to rescue people from dangers and troubles. What’s in their heart shows in their eyes. Someone you can read like an open Bengali book, fluently—it’s easy to get along with them. When an angry person’s rage subsides, they hold no more resentment toward the person they were angry with. On the contrary, they themselves suffer in infinite regret for why they had been so angry and ill-behaved. At that moment, they become the kindest person in the world. Ah!
Thought: Ninety-nine.
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Some people are born with an infinite capacity to make others feel wretched. How terribly well they manage this task of crushing spirits! Sometimes they don’t even need to move their lips—a mere glance suffices. What a dreadful gift! Some eyes are far too devoid of tenderness. The act of making someone’s heart sink can sometimes equal a thousand murders. Looking into the eyes of someone deeply wounded is among the world’s most difficult tasks. Yet some people blessed with this talent for inflicting misery can do exactly that. With hard, merciless eyes and a smiling face, they stare at the one who suffers. How do they manage it? The business of being heartbroken doesn’t end quickly. The rule of heartbreak is this: once the heart breaks, it keeps breaking more and more, continuously. After a while, the heart simply refuses to mend. When someone’s heart is broken but no one around can tell, or perhaps they themselves won’t let it show, when despite every effort they cannot speak—in such moments, the entire face of heartbreak gets painted with some melancholy brush in their eyes. Gathering in the corners of both eyes, pain accumulates until it finally spills as tears. At that moment, the heart feels strangely light. What joy there is in being able to cry! Not everyone can manage it; some can. And even those who can don’t always succeed—sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. Can everyone really weep? For those who are deeply proud, even that beautiful release of heavy tears doesn’t occur. The colors of nature and the colors of the heart don’t always match. Hearts can break even in brilliant sunshine, while someone can hum happily even in torrential rain. There are some people who can be read like fairy tales, clearly and completely. When their hearts cry, their eyes don’t smile. When their hearts smile, their eyes don’t weep. They are deeply good. Even seeing them in heartbreak evokes profound tenderness. Though not in everyone. Feeling compassion for certain things also requires a kind of strength. There are people who walk carefully even when stepping on grass. It takes great strength to feel tenderness for these humble creations of nature. Not everyone possesses this. Some people are different altogether. They wear perfect masks. They can hide everything. Their joy and sorrow’s existence or non-existence—both are nearly equal. This doesn’t mean this group consists entirely of the world’s clever and wicked people. Good people too hide their tears and live for years and years. Bad people’s hearts break less often. It’s very easy to break a good person’s heart. If one could live without feeling, many would gladly accept the burden of living as a good person. Soft-hearted, emotional people get heartbroken with the slightest wound. Sometimes tears fall in gentle drops. If someone happens to glimpse these tears in a moment’s confusion, the intense guilt that follows makes them feel terribly small. Sometimes it even saves the very person who broke their heart. Much of life’s disappointments and gains-and-losses stem from misunderstandings. The anger and resentment that accumulate behind one’s back would lighten considerably if addressed face-to-face. But speaking directly with the person one is angry with—that’s the hardest task of all.
Who will break this ice that is older than a thousand years, vaster than the Himalayas? How impossibly difficult it becomes sometimes to simply say sorry! This reckoning with oneself is so very hard! Even as one is about to dissolve entirely, there is no escape from its grip. Relationships, breaking apart this way, turn acquaintances into friends. The ego torments us terribly, causes such pain! Yet one cannot exist without ego either! Perhaps freedom from this eternal conflict comes only through death—spiritual or physical.
O God! If you’re going to give us a mind, why didn’t you throw in some bonus years for all the time we spend feeling miserable?
Thought: Ninety.
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Not everyone can love everyone else. What appeals to whom and when never aligns with what ought to appeal to them. Even the most refined person might fall for someone utterly bohemian, reckless, and wild. There’s nothing wrong with that. A beautiful, delicate girl might be drawn to a man who keeps his hair long, has hollow cheeks, lights one cigarette from the dying ember of another, equates celebration with the bliss of drink and drugs, punches someone’s nose bloody the moment his temper flares, pays no attention to clothes, barely bothers to shave, whistles at women with sideways glances, and spends day and night roaming with girlfriends. There’s nothing wrong with this attraction. Everyone’s life is their own. Now suppose this girl meets a boy who possesses none of these traits. Gradually, she begins to like him. She wants him to change, to become what she desires. He cannot. How could he? Can one simply start smoking cigarettes overnight? Does taking on the burden of being stoned on marijuana become effortless in an instant? Not everyone can do everything. For some, writing long essays is easier than growing long hair. Writing a two-page movie review is simpler than becoming a rough-and-tumble film hero. Why must everyone master the style of dismissing Rabindranath as “fucking hackneyed old-fashioned” at the drop of a hat? It’s not as if doing such things prevents one from being a good student—meaning one who gets good results—or a good person. I’m not saying one approach is more valuable than another. I’m simply saying: let whoever values something seek out someone for whom it flows naturally in their blood! Why do some people love playing that game which can so easily be mistaken for life itself? Not everyone has the ability to distinguish between what is play and what is life. A person cannot change their inner essence. If I cannot love that inner self, yet remain caught in the dilemma of whether I love them or not, going on pretending to love them—what kind of hypocrisy is this? If another person mistakes my confusion for love, won’t their silent resentment and pain return to consume me like a curse?
You can’t bring yourself to love someone completely, yet you yearn to love them? Try to see if they truly change in the way you desire, or whether you can transform yourself to suit their heart. How long will you wait for this to happen? Only until your love enters the realm of being ‘taken for granted.’ Why must you love at all? Has someone sworn you to it? What burden is this that you carry? Of the body? Fine, I accept that. But why must you say ‘I love you’ for that? In the vast kingdom of love, this body is smaller than even a tiny cottage. And yet we conduct ourselves as if that insignificant cottage were the entire realm? Let the body’s demands be met by the body; why drag love into this unnecessary tussle? One who cannot distinguish between the claims of body and mind is no lover, but merely a man; no beloved, but merely a woman. Don’t persist in this forced performance of love. You may be a good actor or actress, but not everyone is a good audience. Some never grasp the performance in their entire lives, mistaking it for love throughout, preferring to remain mistaken. I implore you, don’t think that everything will work out someday. By then it may be too late, yet nothing will have been set right.
Why do some people love so much to cause pain, to bring sadness, to make others weep?
Thought: Ninety-one.
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Some people love in silence.
I wish someone like that would come forward and say, I love you! If not openly, then at least whisper it in hiding.
Before I unknowingly drift away, let them come close from afar! I possess a great strength. It is this: I know how to love and how to be loved. Therefore, do not make yourself a criminal by thinking love a crime.
I don’t want the flowers of your love’s garland to wait, hoping to fall upon my grave. The dead cannot breathe in the fragrance of flowers. To dead eyes, even the most vibrant flower spreads no color.
Some people hate in secret.
I wish those who love me would whisper to me in secret: Remove so-and-so from your life. If you cannot remove them, at least stay cautious of them. It’s not that they don’t know how to love. The point is, they hate you……. Someone should point them out to me. I consider such people my greatest friends.
To hate someone, one must waste time pursuing them. What do they gain by squandering precious time on someone they don’t even like—I cannot understand this. I’m tempted to verify whether they truly have endless time to spare for hating me. If so, I’ll save them some of that time. There are people who cannot live without hating others. I want them to find someone new to hate in that time. And eventually, let that new someone remove them from their life. Then let them seek out someone new again. Keeping hatred alive is an ongoing process.
Those who do not know how to love — we want to ostracize them. Let them form their own society, like the society of the blind in Saramago’s ‘Blindness.’ A society of the despicable. This society is itself despised. If we could remove them, I would have time to receive the love of more people with bowed head, to pay homage to their love. I still wish to love the love of human beings.
Those who do not love — one can still live with them.
But those who hate — one cannot live with them. Not for one’s own sake, not for theirs. If I stay with them, it’s their problem; if they stay with me, it’s mine. What’s the point?
I want at least some people to be freed from the burden of having to hate me. It hurts to hate someone, doesn’t it!
You love — please say so (publicly or privately). They do not love — please say this too (publicly or privately). They hate — please do say this (privately).
I promise you, I will always remember this favor of yours, I will remain forever grateful to you.