Translated from the Bengali by Rajat Chaudhuri

Ominous Owl

Hasn’t been possible in all this time to get cured
of sorrow and moonless nights
Your association’s suspect.
In a single life, how much longer can one keep
building shelters like columns of ants
Or accept a wind driven sound or watery detachment
You cringe from the fear of anonymous letters
Or remain locked-up in the hot suffocating dark.
Dangling like bats and writing all those stories
Of being irresistible!

_

Maple Leaf

A storm is raging, a secret panic spreading through this city virus-like
It’s called death. Death can, at any time
Break your neck, you wouldn’t even know.
You only worry whether death will be easy
Or horrifying! Only if those who passed away would come and say how bearable
Was the time of death. You move around panic-stricken,
Watch the white kash flowering, watch how blue’s the autumn sky. The arrival of the
Goddess,
Buddha’s message of non-violence, the sad figure of Jesus cannot
Reassure you. You think you will set out to get rid of this death panic.
But whereto? The life-threatening tussle between belief and disbeilief,
Lurks everywhere. You sing maple leaf, maple leaf.
‘Doesn’t know it will snow in some days
Its beauty will get buried by winter’s whip.’

_

Hubbub

Today, after long, all leaves of the forest are murmuring. The tree
Much enjoying their hubbub. There’s a tug at its roots. Deep secret
Tunes echo, a fiery breath touches veins and veinlets.
With apprehensions of wildfires it looks far into the forest and then again
Spreads its wings to the sky as if seized by a merry wind. Today
Is communion for heavy clouds afloat in weightless free winds.
Today’s like the youthful Shodashi, invitation in her eyes. Today the rain sings Mirabai.

These translated poems are forthcoming in an anthology of Bengali poetry from India and Bangladesh, The Great Bengali Poetry Underground translated by Rajat Chaudhuri and published by Kitaab Singapore.