রবিবার, ১৭ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৯

সোমবার, ১১ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৯

The Hungryalists

Binoy Majumdar

Arunesh Ghosh

Falguni Ray

Anil Karanjai

Sandipan Chattopadhyay

Tridib Mitra

Samiran Ghosh

Shakti Chattopadhyay

Debi Roy

Subimal Basak

Nitya Malakar

Arun Banik

Karuna Nidhan Mukhopadhyay

Samir Roychoudhury

Subhas Ghosh

Sambhu Rakshit

Malay Roychoudhury

Pradip Chowdhuri and Subo Acharya

Saileswar Bhosh

Abani Dhar

Utpalkumar Basu

Raja Sarkar and Aloke Goswami

Tridib Mitra, George Dowden and Subimal Basak

Debdas Acharya

Samir Roychoudhury, Malay Roychoudhury
and Utpal Kumar Basu

Basudeb Dasgupta

Alo Mitra and Tridib Mitra

Ajitkumar Bhaumik

Selim Mustafa

Arup Datta

Cover collage of 99th Hungryalist Bulletin

Critical Analysis of Hungryalist Movement

History of Hungryalist Movement

রবিবার, ১০ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৯

Hungryalists and the Beatniks: Malay Roychoudhury Interviewed Part-2

"The Hungryalists" reviewed by Madhavi S Mahadevan in The New Indian Express

The Hungryalists: The Poets Who Sparked a Revolution
By: Maitreyee Bhattacharjee Chowdhury
Publisher: Penguin Viking
Pages: 272; Price: `599

Oh, I’ll die! I’ll die! I’ll die!
My skin is in blazing furore
I do not know what I’ll do, where I’ll go, Oh I’m sick
I’ll kick all Arts in the butt and go away, Shubha.

Thus begins Malay Roy Choudhury’s Bengali poem Prachanda Boidyutik Chhutar (Stark Electric Jesus). Appearing in a pamphlet in 1964, its publication resulted in arrest warrants being issued against the poet and 11 others, members of a Kolkata-based poets’ collective—the Hungry Generation. And the charges? Conspiracy against the state and literary obscenity.

Who were these radicals, where did they come from and what happened to them is the substance of Maitreyee Bhattacharjee Chowdhury’s non-fiction book, The Hungryalists: The Poets Who Sparked a Revolution. Well-researched, it draws on journals, memoirs, photographs, interviews and personal conversations with brothers Malay and Samir, part of movement’s founding quartet (the other two being Shakti Chatterjee and the Dalit poet Haradhan Dhara aka Debi Roy).

Following a loose timeline, the author dispenses with the notion of unity: anecdotes, sketches and generalisations abound, sometimes befuddling the reader by their randomness. However, the mood music of the age—intense, rebellious, raucous—comes through clearly.

Though homegrown, the Hungryalists were part of a global wave of insurrectionist poetry that had earlier seen the rise of Beatdom in the United States. Calling the Beats and the Hungryalists ‘co-travellers’, the author writes, ‘These poets/ writers rejected standards of literature, introduced new societal norms, shunned mercenaries of culture and even spawned a new drug subculture’. Solidarity between the movements was enabled when prominent Beat poets such as Gary Snyder and his wife Joanne Kyger, Allen ‘Howl’ Ginsberg and his lover Peter Orlovsky travelled to India and associated with the Hungryalists.

Though the two movements had similarities as sociocultural forces, the book elucidates the completely different circumstances that fashioned the Hungryalists’ poetics. The post-Partition decade of the 50s saw rapid changes in Bengali society: a flood of refugees, homelessness, food shortages, rising unemployment, the stench and anger of rampant poverty. It was an all-encompassing rootlessness unrepresented in the prosaic literary writing of the period—what Malay Roy Choudhury called ‘the blankety-blank school of modern poetry’.

The Hungryalists wanted more: a new lexis, a new literary space, a wider audience. Above all, a shake-up. Their agenda was to ‘introduce chaos and a disintegration in writing that rendered it conventionally meaningless, and take advantage of the shock it created, thereby introducing the ideas they wanted to talk about’. Raw emotions needed raw language: obscenity became a moral weapon. Viewing poetry as an oral tradition, they held public readings in Howrah railway station, College Street Coffee House, Khalasitola bar and the grave of the long-dead Michael Madhusudan Dutt—whom the Hungryalists idolised.

Co-authorship and collaboration being a feature of their identity, they met regularly at ‘addas’. Another commonality was penury: public loos, empty offices and renting space on terraces with other homeless formed their sleeping arrangements. Despite their travails they persisted with their poetry. The literati were unamused; repercussions followed in the form of police raids, handcuffs, a trial and betrayals. Nevertheless, the subaltern had found a voice that has lasted. While the Beats are well-documented, the Hungryalists are not. This book is a worthy attempt to fill the gap.

শনিবার, ৯ ফেব্রুয়ারী, ২০১৯

Malay Roychoudhury's Poetry of Dissent : Translated by Mahashweta Bose ; finalised by author

Malay Roychoudhury's Poetry of Dissent Translated from Bengali to English.

Protest in Poetry ( First stage translation by Mahashweta Bose, finalised by the author ) )

Nay-Ballad

From uncoiled wings of the burning swan
after sea of blood was born out of green caterpillar
that skin sheared moon from cloud’s underbelly
ordered waves to abolish horoscopes on crabs’ breasts
.
On the evergreen epiglotis of lotus full to the brim
the pollen fiddling honey bee waved her double scarf
searched for drunk village of pride red beating crowd
humming songs sleeping side by side of worried distance
.
( Translation of ‘Na-Ballad’. Written on 15 August 1999 )

A Quasi Governmental Report

Unarmed military offered prayers
One tin water is for ten rupees
.
Underground river cut off from source
Habitually disgusted because of envy
.
Strong words used for sealing border
Public Works Department has broken
.
Since at the day’s end in share market
A woman’s body cut in two with sickle
.
Postal ballot in hand amid tomato field
Lying pristine with great expectations
.
Ambitious pair of shoes for parliament
Let them say whatever face betray
.
As if rice field is scared of Tiger’s roar
Daughter of cultivator is in ministry
.
Tired cuckoo-man grieving due to son’s death
From football field corner in direct shot
.
Solved the problem of freedom movement
On the forehead of dead that was the truth
.
( Translation of ‘Ekti Adha-Sarkari Protibedan’. Written in 1996 )

Sonpur Fair, Evening of Gumrahi Tart

Sliding jute curtain
flickers in tent lantern
dot beauty gait her
small coins in betel box
was counting tobacco scent
in broken wine glasses
.
half naked on rope cot
coin colour country liquor
leather shoes well oiled
beat stick resting at corner
and yellow stain turban
cheese-penis landlord
.
atoned in elephant shit
put red petticoat on shoulder
switched song amplifier
hemp torn milk wet
eye on eye sharp dark
depends on who is beneath
.
myrobalan under tongue
betel nut cutter in waist
box full of scent tobacco
corset on blown breast
strung undies on string
one suck tumbling tart
.
artificial hair on bamboo pole
hypnotized hornet-man
mosquito on naked bum
his thighs are of mafioso
one and five coins for police
she is whatever fair or pure
.
( Translation of ‘Shonpur Mela, Gumrahi Baier Sandhya’ L

Ruffian

I who am a swapping lapwing’s bullet ridden sky

was born out of drowned water filled bison’s horn
in idle-eye noon beneath the pearly neem tree
was enjoying black blonde’s adornment of soft-paw brows
in rain drenched gold-flower tucked in coiffure’s knot
.
I who am standing in front of grilled horizon of meadow-dawn
on the trampled foot-printed grass of mourning sun’s wet-earth
heard nightlong wood mite’s buzz in my last wallowed bed
thought why should purposefulness be bad my dear
is not there art of sweat-salt in labour of post a chair holds
.
I who asked gallinules what taste do you get from wings of butterflies
like chipko playing bride of thrice-wed groom’s hoof-sound headgear
am in a ship evading lighthouse’s beam a saw-teeth shark
in the Secretariat cage-lift with a clerk having breasts of Jamini Roy painting
bawled shrieks of rider throwing stallion’s bridle snapping neigh
.
I who am a whispering song sung in cricket’s musical notation
have trapped Hilsa fish shoals’ colours in vagina shaped nets
beneath the fig tree of hanged martyrs during freedom movement
from corners of caterpillar-chewed perfumed lemon leaves
flying out in sky from nape shaved hillock of stone chip proprietor

( Translation of ‘Tapori’. Written on March 1, 1990 )

Crematorium, 1992

During a paddy husk flying noon, from the corpse of a white-owl, gnat children

were stealing butter

with their hands having fragrance of rice crispies

picked up lightly the throttled shrieks of last akanda flowers

in the brittle breeze of Jaisalmer

sickly happy

at the spiraling city, blood drenched minute hand of wall clock

and the faces were beaming in wood fire warmth

pigeons fluttered making sounds of torn documents, just a bit

of living one’s own life

from those colours of sunset eyebrows, on the sad boat at web-tide

dead body wrapped in coarse mattress

I walked towards the gold rimmed estuary

in my palm I held the split moment of a knotted storm

at the breast beating grief of thrown parched rice

that was only mine

The Clapper

Then set out after repeated warning the grizzly

Afghan Duryodhan

in blazing sun

removed sandal-wood blooded stone-attired guards

spearing gloom brought out a substitute of dawn

crude hell’s profuse experience

Huh

a night-waken drug addict beside head of feeble earth

from the cruciform The Clapper could not descend due to lockdown

wet-eyed babies were smiling

in a bouquet of darkness in forced dreams

The Clapper wept when learnt about red-linen boat’s drowned passengers

in famished yellow winter

white lilies bloomed in hot coal tar

when in chiseled breeze

nickel glazed seed-kernel

moss layered skull which had moon on its shoulder scolded whole night

non-weeping male praying mantis in grass

bronze muscled he-men of Barbadoz

pressed their fevered forehead on her furry navel

in comb-flowing rain

floated on frowning waves

diesel sheet shadow whipped oceans

all wings had been removed from the sky

funeral procession of newspaperman’s freshly printed dawn

lifelong jailed convict’s eye in the keyhole

outside

in autumnal rice pounding pink ankle

Lalung ladies

echo forgets to shriek back sensing the beauty of sweat’s fragrance

thereafter

Operation Bullshit

ulcer in mouth

numb-penis young rebel’s howl on the martyr platform

non-veg heart daubed in onion paste

black eyed flowers

drenched lotus flower suffered from pneumonia

cloud’s forced roar on a hookah smoking octogenarian train

and lightning covered with gold laced spider web

frog-maid dropped a fat toad from her back

creamy hell-fairy of Babylon

fed medicine tablets to north facing clouds

swirling green fireflies on castor-oil lamp

splints of songs from the crown of ruffled hair comet-face princess

swan with blood-stained feet

prayed for a spring season for the repatriated armies

who arranged green-bed farmland for the shot-dead rebel’s parents

sulphur mist spread through secret savanna of lion-skin poachers

marriageable horseman The Clapper

Heigh ho

suffering from angst of a little unrecognition

the garden which lifted the betel-nut palms on little finger

in long distance cyclone

below the lamppost

covered by clothes of rain

that broken gait is his form

the profile which searched for relaxing waves

the universe in tandava trance

mouth blocked with leucoplast tape inside a temple

The Clapper

when fire separates from smoke

within that flash

the epiglotis

feels bitter between two heart beats

feverish rebels invade through sluice-gate

palash flowers united themselves in blooming red during the cyclone

just like futureless in zoos

in the last breeze

tin-bordered clouds exploded firecrackers

as if The Clapper will appear just now

in the morning the sweeper gathered all clappers assembled during night

in painless love

shoved sick Ganges river in a bag

one or three colour flapping rainbow

food plates were found in graves

bone columns fell due to wails of exploiteds

nobody is happy

when asked how are you replied

fine

handed over rings of barbed wire from their waist

after the oath ceremony of depraved

corpse collectors started visiting towns and villages

people prayed for their right to cry

somewhere else The Clapper

in fractured health

was trying to correct the songs of birds

in star flickering darkness

pillow hugging rainy nights

fish smelling asthma of slippery catfishes in Palamou Jehanabad Rohtas districts

on the eyelids of snail-chin old woman gray dusts of salt-petre-sulpher

for listening to songs of small wide-eyed fishes of half rotten Hooghly river

winter’s fine moult came out of cobra-girl’s attire

suddenly a porcupine

kapok flowers in red wedding dress

young sunflower stared on the side

healthy crab danced in hot oil raising her two scarlet hands

white muslin soft fairies leaped in rice-bowl

after he wept in darkness The Clapper smiled in light

listened to the jingle of shackles with which he was tied to hospital bed

nightlong tick tock of incarceration of the table clock

( Translation of Bengali poem ‘Hattali’ )

Blood Lyric

Abontika, my house was invaded midnight in search of you
Not like her not like him nor like them
Comparable not to this not to that not to it

What have I done for poetry plunging into lava-spewing volcano ?
What are these ? What are these ? Result of searches at home
of Poetry ? Bromide sepia babies from Dad’s broken almirah
of Poetry ! Mom’s Benares sari torn out of hammered box
of Poetry ! Breaths are recorded in the seizure list
of Poetry ! Show me show me what else is coming out
of Poetry ! Shame on you; girl’s half-licked guy ! Die you die
of Poetry ! Wave piercing sharks chew up flesh & bone
of Poetry ! AB negative sun from small intestine knots
of Poetry ! Asphyxiated speed stored in impatient footprints
of Poetry ! Delicate tart-glow in piss flooded jail
of Poetry ! Mustard flower pollen on prickly feet of bumblebee
of Poetry ! Hungry farmer in dirty loincloth on salty dry land
of Poetry ! Rotten blood on feathers of corpse eating vultures
of Poetry ! Sultry century in faded humid spiteful crowd
of Poetry ! Black death shrieks of intelligence in guillotine
of Poetry ! You die you die you die why didn’t you die
of Poetry ! Fire in your mouth fire in your mouth fire
of Poetry ! You die you die you die you die you die
of Poetry ! Not like her not like him nor like them
of Poetry ! Comparable not to this not to that not to it
of Poetry ! Abontika, they came in search of you, why didn’t take you along !!
( Translation of Blood Lyric )
Mumbai 2011

Nail Cutting and Love

Tagore, this is for you after one fifty years :
who clipped your nails in offshore lands–
that foreign lady ? Or the chick adulators ?
There isn’t any photograph of yours with
your hands placed on laps of young ladies
cutting nails ; your feet on Ocampo’s knee ?

May be the girls on whose shoulder Gandhi placed
his wings, cut his nails. As you know, it’s so painful
to reach the nail-cutter up to one’s feet at old age–
oh, men like me without young girls for company
are aware. Love’s strange demand from senile age.

Gossipers say Sunil Ganguly did have for each nail
a struggling poetess. Joy Goswami also have had
the same ; the girls closed eyes and jumped into muck.
I’d seen Shakti Chattopadhyay’s lover clipping his nails
in the small Chaibasa room. Does Sharat do same for Bijoya ?

Yashodhara, did Trinanjan ever cut your nails ?
Subodh, have you ever took Mallika’s feet
on your lap and cut her nails ? Just a glance
at the feet of a poet tells you how lonely he is.
Think of Jibanananda ; he has been searching for
Banalata for thousand years for his nails to be cut.
( Translation of Nokh Kata O Prem )
Mumbai 2010

Immortality

Those who beat us to death after village court trial, they
did not spare you as well, Abontika ! We rotten corpses
drift in muddy Hooghly river ; what was our crime ?
You are Party boss’s wife, I am just an uncivil nobody.
There were endless praise of communism in last 33 years ;
nothing for lovers. For whose benefit were the tomes–
whatever are left of the rotten corpses of lovers remain
metamorphosed domestic bullocks yoked to grinding,
useless party-worker. Better to exude on chariot of waves
to the seas clutching each other in oceanic splendour.
( Translation of Amaratwa )
Kolkata 2006

Salt & Betrayers

Abontika, and had said, ‘Ah salty beauty
heart of heart…scent of masculinity…’
That day, from Police custody to Court
rope tied to my waist and handcuffed
I walked along with murderers hoodlums;
circus loving crowd on both sides of road.

The betrayers, who volunteered in
court to testify against me, said, when
they came down from witness-box, ‘No,
the sweat was sweet and not salty ; thus
no question of treachery could arise–
and should not be marked as Betrayers.’
( Translation of Noon O Nimakharami )
Kolkata, 2005

The Spam Mistress

This is interesting ! In a flash you entered my desktop with mail
topless polygirl your smiling invite for a black night fling
The hungry wolf in me looks at Baudelairian dark Venus.
In funny English you’ve written on your belly you love me
princess Africa hooker girl exposed trapdoor for love
adorable soft thighs. What’s that, colour or blood on shaman-nails ?

Which country are you from, mischief-sissy ? Kenya Uganda
Zambia Burkina Faso Congo Cameroon Sudan Niger ?
I am sure you’ve ganged up in Mumbai’s Nijerwadi.
How did you know I have never slept with an African chick !
Delightful to say the least your lighted lap sex appeal
you know quite well . That’s why invite for an embrace.
How many Rupees or Dollars for that experience
you haven’t indicated ; just a call to meet at Meera Road
Junction, where you’ll descend in flesh from digital beauty.
( Translation of Spam Premika )
Mumbai 2009

Green Godchild

Oh, so you are the divine beauty I read about
in adolescence, whom Toulouse Lautrec, Rimbaud,
Verlaine, Baudelaire, Van Gogh, Modigliani et all
held on to waist curvature and took flights to
healing sweetness of inebriated light
blazing hallucinatory juice of green lichen
on the coloured thighs of sizzling dance girls
who broke rhythms and picked up their
contorted feelings on paper or canvas

At De Wallen crowds in Amsterdam
wide mouth I ogle at almost naked
showcased blonde dark brown ladies
sourced from all over the world
pink halo tinkling in semi-dark rooms
twenty minutes fixed missionary style.
I count Euros in my pocket and switch
to the old controversy of form versus content :
which generates more happiness and how
is Absinthe different from others ?
The guide retorts, ‘Why don’t you sleep
yourself and see semen turning green !’
( Translation of Sobuj Devkanya )
Amsterdam, 2007

Love Returns or Love Does Not Return

Saw you Abontika squatting on a milestone in gracious moonlit midwinter
your back and chest still carrying 44 year old dust and dry grass
wale mark of rashes all over your body due to moon’s crime, aha, result of peity
you were shivering may be due to a vortex of hookworm in abdomen
your ivy strand golden hair flowed down your shoulders up to waist
seated on the signstone completely naked on third day of November
guides of death in guise of mosquitoes sang Death Metal around your head
you do not remember the last lover who deserted you at this place.
I said, ‘Abontika, do you still possess the 9mm pistol
with which you had killed me ?’
Waving your Naxal hand you brought down the pistol from air and
emptying all bullets on my chest you said,’Ya, here it is !’
I scooped out 44 year old bullets from my chest and placed on your invisible hand–
You said, ‘That’s good, we shall meet again Comrade.’
( Translation of Prem Pherey Pherey Naa )
Mumbai 2009

Elopegirl

I could not find you in your bedroom , what a mess, am at a loss
Abontika, which river has seduced you ? I unanchored my iceberg boat
have a look, in Keleghai Churni Gumni Joldhaka Mayurakshi Kangsaboti rivers’
currents, no trace of scent of your sweat, am sad, the fishermen also
could not find your blind touch, full-moon is in the dark,
how would I manage, onions are not weeping, shit,
bangles are clamourless, in which dream you have saved the kisses
I could not locate, you could have informed someone, reflection of your face
you had thrown away along with mirror, oh what a problem, at least
you could have left behind bed sighs, why the almirah is empty,
whom did you donate hair-oil from pillow and birth-mark of your navel
I could not recognize the voice of your mind, toothbrush is without music
slippers are without dance, why do you give such agony Abontika, your
name used to be tied with your fallen hair, I could not find even after sweeping the floor,
your office going road is waiting for you inside cobweb of spiders
your fish-breath drawing routes on the palm has gone astray
there, there, that bugger with whom you fled, his
musical notes of shoe-marks are loitering on the marble floor
( Translation of Elopekanya )
Mumbai 2012

Stoniness

Midnight may be called a kind of colour dogs dislike
stones too despise being locked up whole life within its breast
if picked up by someone at midnight it hurts their solid guilt feeling
it wakes up and listens to the dog’s moans
why is there such difference with a dead snail which even after death
has the right to nurture her lover’s gestures inside heart
probably because of blessings of sighs of couples
even a drunkard would not throw a dead snail at a dog
would abuse if he steps on it and hurts himself
but that is done by all lovers amid busy crowd
in the flesh of the snail whispers of his lover
continuously resonate to respond to sex-waves
pity the stone without a female organ
( Translation of Pathorata )
Mumbai 2012

Counter Discourse

Relentless salty invite of sea was telling me I am not the same I used to be dear
I am not because after my legs were tied to railing of a hospital bed

cultivators’ river and labourers’ river were flowing separately on both side of bed
an enforced discipline in which the sun rises and sets only once throughout the day

if one has to draw comparison one would say it is not wedding vows of frog and snake
when the half-wet seed has for the last time embraced its sprout

I knew I was not as I used to be as locks of all words have been opened
days are such that roses refuse to bloom without bonemeal of saints at roots

and some bugger has spitted red at the corner of the sky and fled
may be… may be… the raven seated upon the head of scarecrow

from the rag-stitched water of the pond during springtime noon
I have cleaned and picked up the last piece of shadow of my own
( Translation of Counter Discourse )
Kolkata, 30 March 2000

Objectivity

Regaining consciousness in a trickle
Hands & feet tied and mouth gagged on a railroad track
The silent whole
Shirt and trousers daubed in dew
Whining crickets drone
A rural gloom studded with night-chilled stars
Can’t shout as mouth is wool of spew
Ribs and shinbone smitten — not possible to move
Stiff stonechips bite at back
How beautiful is the world and peace everywhere allround calm
A pinhead light is rushing on rail route piercing the one-eyed dark
( Translation of Pratyaksha )
1986

Kurmitola, Jehanabad, 1989, Evening

Mother

while standing in waterweed, in the kitchen, in her petticoat, was caught

by police, her hair unkempt

in wintery autumn flying horses stored in glass jar held in left hand, knitted in loincloth

a comet from the yellow piece of cloud

she floated her boat made of hay, unconcerned, lilies within shouts of children

I know what will happen to her now

Abdul, Gafoor’s brother, was first to bring the news

but Mother gave up, hazy domesticity in the dusts of her brows

why did she conceal behind Goddess Kali’s lamp-oil

broken pulses and rice crumbs brought from Murshidabad

a little sun tainted skin, in unknown fear, palm on her chin, forgot her own name

damp shadows on her hung face

brain completely naked

in drizzling dewdrops, smiled a skinny deer

wooden shoes on snow, sky facing wolves, she cried whole day

the priest

drew blood in a syringe from her hand

pain at the corner of her lips, was tired to climb the stairs

( Translation of Kurmitola, Jehanabad, 1989, Sondhya )

To Save People of West Bengal

I do not know why
inside pinkflesh jailhouse of a shark’s stomach
during domesticated dangers in a wet honest alley of wayward rains
when the 205 route bus carrying darkness on shoulders reached Babughat
driver said go carefully to other side of river as it has gone for spawning to the sea
you must be aware apart from rotten corpses other funerals have been banned

I do not know why
in the No Entry zone where only scoundrels win
saw the parasite-ear crater-mouth reporter counting
with painless hands of Duhshasan ashes of last breath from burning pyre
whose only job was to contradict other people’s opinion in the motherland of bugs

I do not know why
men who prefer to lend tongue instead of ear to rumours
when they made it free to board and eat for accepting disorder as peace
victory arose from self named grave of poison smeared sheepfold
everyone was shouting Hail Revolution but we do not want transferable jobs

I do not know why
the day ditched girl inside frog-echo water-well
floated upward — sweet memory of iron-weight at grocer’s shop
was balancing wheat flour for Satyanarayan Puja
demeanour was such as if southern breeze was tickling fishes brought on land

I do not know why
faster than dementia of a wound’s remembrance of pain
I saw funeral ants in a row carrying candy particles on corpse’s forehead
( Translation of Pashchimbanger Manushkey Banchatey Holey )
Mumbai, 17 February 1999

Democratic Centralism

To be honest I became plywood leader after giving up cultivation of teeth & nails
when I am in disguise my real appearance slips out
is there any original work other than self-hostility ? Tell me !

To be honest I am a loose eagle haggard in dilapidated sky
I feign to pretend and pass it on as life
I lead domesticity in a hackery on swimmer dribbling stream

To be honest I hammer out stone from heart of stone and find
through sandy glance rows of turtle-flesh eater gout sufferers
searching for wing-flight smiles from drowned girl’s livid lips

To be honest while I weep during adulterated smoke offerings of ghee
I create truth create death create up & down circles
the snake was inside its hole I insert my hand to bewitch it as well.
( Translation of Ganatantrik Kendrikata )
Kolkata, 27 November 1999

The Empty Womb

After having layers of dust on ear lobes on breeze stitched paddy field
when cobra children started dancing around me
pointing nude fingers toward husky darkness
I saw jingled sounds of sunrise amid whispers of rain
the four squared universe seen through soft barrel hole of a rifle
which was encircled by a thorn crowned slogan-wet wall

After the garden came forward to receive me
dancing bells of cobra mom-dad were strewn all over grass
and cobra housewife reminded several times
she would expose and reveal the real thing

The lady whose beauty I had ravished just by a glance at her
I could glean through twisted arms of her sexless embrace
my horoscope on dazzling liquid breast of the crab
licked with smooth kissing lips by cobra housewife

At the happy eating festival of the menu-card funeral
the sick street dog licked its own shadow from bodyfur
and over the bread crumbed map only then
ant columns marched from one country to another
( Translation of Shunya Garbha )
Ahmednagar, 12 October 1997

Two Worlds

We know we are incapable of redemption
but because of it why in your rain-echo drenched stingy lungs
piranha shoals would swim wearing pink raincoats

Rumour is your veins carry ashen flight of one-dialect pigeons
we’ve heard you used to tame fat-belly clouds with your blind vision
you used to tuck donkey brays of your daily diary in your armpits
and now you claim that even Karna of Mahabharata did not donate his vote

Everybody is aware that only coffin bearers are immortal
since you did not get someone to talk to in darkness of semen
you searched for an one-shot lover in clocktowerless city
you scoundrels don’t you have any address or it is your sinister blood
that the wrinkled mirror carries your pulpable image throughout the day

Shame shame shame you want back the breath after you breathe it out
I thought you would apply your power of doubt
instead you are shredding your prehistoric body-hair with ding dong cotton-gin

My best wishes you get both hands of Duhshasana of Mahabharata
with which you may count the sparkles of flints in your fort of smoke
( Translation of Duti Bishwa )
27 April 2000

Bite

India, Sir, how long will you carry on like this, really, I feel awful
India, I ate your jail food for complete one month which means for 30 days
No job since September 1964, you know India, would you mind lending me 20 bucks ?
India, those guys are very bad, even rats are eating away your grains
What did Suhrawardy advise you in the Control Room India ?
O tell me — I am really happy, promise, I can make faces !
And I do not know where Kolkata is hurtling in this bitter renaissance
India, why don’t you get a few of my pulp published in Nabokallol magazine
I’ll also become saint, or guide us to Santiniketan
We would be servant of literature, you would give me a set of cultural attire
Let us go to country liquor den Khalasitola today evening, we would cook Bengali culture
India, why aren’t you exploding an atom bomb, fireball suits the sky !
Do you want to try LSD ? Both of us would sunbathe at Nimtala crematoria
India, here, take this handkerchief, wipe your specs
In this election please help me win, I’d contest from Chilika lake
Which lecture of yours is going to be published in tomorrow’s newspaper, India ?
I have snatched the key from them which keeps you going
India, I surreptitiously read the love letters written to you
Why don’t you cut your nails ? There are dark patches beneath your eyes
Why don’t you apply colour to your teeth these days ?
You kill in revenge but blame us for murder when we follow you
Don’t think I am just a cat’s paw
How about a self-compromise eating one’s own heart
India, withdraw Section 144 of Penal Code from paddy fields
Send all great books to Vietnam, Huh Huh
May be the war will stop
India, tell me what exactly you want !!
( Translation of Kamor )
Hungry Bulletin, 26th January 1966.

Chicken Roast

Puff your plume in anger and fight, cock, delight the owner of knife
smear sting with pollen and flap your wings.
As I said : Twist arms and keep them bent
roll the rug and come down the terrace after disturbed sleep
Shoeboots—-rifle—whirring bullets—shrieks

The aged undertrial in the next cell weeps and wants to go home
Liberate me let me go let me go home
On its egg in the throne the gallinule doses
asphyxiate in dark
fight back, cock, die and fight, shout with the dumb

Glass splinters on tongue—breast muscles quiver
Fishes open their gills and enfog water
A piece of finger wrapped in pink paper
With eyes covered someone wails in the jailhouse
I can’t make out if man or woman

Keep this eyelash on lefthand palm–and blow off with your breath
Fan out snake-hood in mist
Cobra’s abdomen shivers in the hiss of feminine urination
Deport to crematorium stuffing blood-oozing nose in cottonwool
Shoes brickbats and torn pantaloons enlitter the streets

I smear my feet with the wave picked up from a stormy sea
That is the alphabet I drew on for letters.
( Translation of Murgir Roast )
1988

Repeat Uhuru

Hood-covered face, hands tied
at the back…On the alter plank
breeze frozen in bitter hangman’s odour
who composes time ?
Doctor Cop Judge Warden or None !

I unfurl myself in the dungeon cloud
where salt-sweating history of dirt is tamed
the rope quivers fast at first
Weak jerks thereafter calm, with dumbness of bawl
wherein bards and butchers repeat their fall
I revive my rise.

This rising is singular. None other for the monster of words
whose feet adore the ruined universe.

I don’t face the gallows every time to keep alive
a dynasty of faith of those who are spawned for death.

Homology

I am ready to be mugged O deadly bat come
Tear off my clothes, bomb the walls of my home
Press trigger on my temple and beat me up in jail
Push me off a running train, intern and trail
I am a seismic yantra alive to glimpse the nuke clash
A heathen mule spermed by blue phallus ass
( Translation of Monushyatantra )
1986
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