Barca-tey kyu...khoya khoya chand ...

it is 2.54 am here now, and i was walking outside my hostel with a cig in hand. 
the sky was clear
and the moon was bright
i sat down somewhere in the open,
on a brick lane and
gazed at the stars..
are the constellations same in barcelona, i wondered..
and then the moon blinked at me
as if in full acceptance of what i feel
she said, fool that you are, the stars are out in barca
and he is possibly studyng his arse off
go sleep and think no more..
so i go up, blew her a kiss and walked the 12 yards back to my room..
the corridors were deserted..
the chill is just creeping in the air
there is a graceful nip stinging the face
even the frogs have gone down their holes
and the kittens are snoozing under the water cooler
only i lonely lass
smitten by your charm,
sleep no more
raise no alarm
silently sit and gaze at the star
distant..
in the distance
thats where you are.....

Amloki konya

sudhu dhu dhu prantor

ar shongey durey,

tire r bege chutey cholechey surjo nicher dikey…

gari tao chutchey

kintu

mon chutey choley aro jorey…

bhabna ta baje bhabey predictable

alpo khoner alaper moton tibro

othocho

khola mather dhulor moton

tarey ami chutey paina…

galey ghosey jae tar choya

hath foshkey jawa roddur er moton

tumio foshkey gele

into the sunset

kono clint eastwood er wild west er cinema moton

shudhu nayok na, ghora chorey amar nayika

kete porlo amae fele rekhe

ar ami shei je kete porlam dilli’r golitey

ajo poth khuje beriye ashtey parlam na

ma dakey – cha khabi to aye

baba boley – portey bosh

kichutei jeno mon lagey na boss

pora khub kothin

tel diye gachey othar moton

uthtey gelei pichley jai

din ta chilo budhbar

dupur dupur lep rodhrey dewar shomoy

dekhlam tomae

tumio chiley chaadey

amloki r bori rakhchiley

ami dekei chilam

mone mone

tomar shonar kotha noy

dak-ta je hariye gelo oi chhad e jete jete

ar tumi phone kaney j kar uddeshye

mishti thont bekiye heshe cheye roiley amar dikey,

ami bhyabachyaka hoye gelam

surjo ta dubeo rodh jhilik dichchey

ki tej bap re,

ajo garir kacher gaye thot rekhe

mone hoy tumi jeno hashcho amae dekhe

amae dekhe, na amar opore

chotto smriti,

chotto rong

bhashan er din heshe hath dhorey mishit khaiyechiley

amar naam tao ki mone pore tomar…

chute choley sumo

chotey pash diye bok

aar mon...

shhe to chutei choley.

Poth Hariye

Aj hothat poth bhule jawar plan holo

Teenmurti,

kintu

dujone dujon er purono bondhu bola jete parey

bola jete parey,

apatoto teen joni teen jon er bondhu.

situation ta alada

cycle er bodoley bike

ar chokhey aviator shades

purono pothei nama holo

jojon khanek dur giyei amar mone holo

kono bikeley baba ma’r sathey

cycle chalanor shei rastatae jeno pouchey gechi

buker bhitor chyat korey uthlo in pain

amar tuktukey lal rong er khudey cycle ta aj nei

kintu boroder sathey palla diye ekkaley ami otae chorey

rajjo joy kore beriyechi

sudhu

aj shei rajjo to neyii

bahon tao missing hoye geche.

Saraswati aj mora khal

Khal eo jol thakey kintu

Sarawatir gaye pana’r prolep

Pashey boshey smriti hatrano r shongey cigarette

Jomey uthtei arekta destination.

Urdhoshash e race, amar amateur photography

Ar tarpori koustuv er chobi tey dekha

Shei aal dhar

Baashboner modhye diye

“Gari choley dum-fhot dum-fhot dum”

Er shurey jekhane giye thamlam

Shetar ek dikey shesh hoyna emon alur khet

Ek prantey aam bagan

Aar

Onno prantey bash bon er shuru, jetar

Shamney amra khanikhon ha korei dariye roilam

Kotha khuje pawa jae na emon shoundorjo

Beshi kichui na

Khet, gach, doba, and bamboos

Etey romantic er ki achey?

But odbht byapar ta ei – amar kintu darun romantic lagjilo

jodio hashir byapar, gaan berulo na ektao…

khanik rodh filter korey abar beriye pora holo

eibar disha Sugandha.

er modhye je kando ti ghotlo

sheta obornonio!

bike theke naamtey giye

ami pa atkey slow motion-ey

dhorashaiye.

Amar jonno shotan bhumi jeno,

in the mood for love

Du teen second chartei chailona!

Uttiya’r sathey dudiner alap

Cigarette kintey giye bhaggish chele ta eta miss kore gelo

jeans ta to onek mather dhuloi kheyeche,

rastar dhulo ta ektu lege gele khoti ki? J

jaega ta money hoy kono age kar diner jomidar bari chilo

khola math, pujor dalan, ar pechoney pukur

Ideal adda jaega

tobey

ajker plan ta ektu alada.

Adda

But mobile adda

From jaega to jaega.

Tel er chinta nei

Shomoy maptey hochhcey na

Ar koustuv er pechoney boshey firey takaley

Uttiya…

Puro black and white-e, visualize kora jak

Khola shirt er pranto duto gaichey urtey urtey

Windlashed hair

And gota scene ta capture kore rekheche

Or aviator shades ta.

Hebbi lagjilo tokey re.

(Amader shobhabi jodio bar khaiye dewa J )

Bari ferar poth

And shesh stop

Dhanno.

Rice research institute er jomi

Rasta ta marka mara

Duniyar shob gari, ghora bolod, ba dhumsho mota truck

Shob giye giye

Hamburger er moton bi-convex korey rekhechey

Du teen bar garir chabi ta khuley esheche er modhye

Ter paini

Bike park kore darano holo

Tarpor bosha

Kora rodher tolae

Hariye jawar chestae nanan attempted trial gulor golpo holo

Ami mugdho hoye shunlam

Durbhaggo

Erom kichu howar shujog kore nitey parini kokhono

Shesh dhoya kathitey taan diye takaiye thaka jae

Durey

Jekhaney kono poth nei, shudhu dhanheen,

Dhan er khet

Pashey pukur tae, duto pola tey dariye dariye bola boli korche,

jol tae thanda holeo, pa’er tolae naki gorom lagjey

michki hashi na!

lutoputi to khachchilami shokal theke

aro khanik ta pet pakrey hasha holo…

ghorir kata to kotha boley

Headquarter theke barey barey siren bajjilo ferar jonno

ogotta.

Depressing byapar

Eto shundor onubhutir modheyi koto jham!

Tobey aj boroi bhalo katlo

Amar hothat khub shadhin-shadin lagjilo.

Eta routine hoye geche money hochche

Koustuv er sathey berulei

Ei byapar ta mone hoy J

Free kothatar maney aj abar notun korey bhebe newa jae.

Asholey

Eromta to roj hoyna

Aar na hoyai bhalo.

Taholey ajker smritituku

shuborno hoye arekta kobitar line hotey parto na

Purono k notun kore pelam

Abar ei notun tai purono hobe

Porer baar.

Ora dujoney thakle.

Abar beriye porbo nirudeshhey

Bhul thikanar khojey.

a love letter

u know,
i wept last night
again.
maybe i'll miss hostel
but you know the truth more than i do
i'll miss you.
recently it has become a metabolism
without which sleep is impossible
but i guess you do not know
maybe someday you will understand the
sadness behind those tears
futile half hearted love
going away is a process
i cannot explain
its like tearing a liver out of your system
or maybe a nose
with which you have grown so used to breathe
im going home to a group of people who love me so
but you will be left alone
maybe i'm wrong
with 85 other residents
not so alone then
watch girls come and go as much as you like
watch people eat, play, laugh
watch the days go by and dusk set in
like we used to
sitting up on the terrace with a spire of smoke
coming from the fag end of the cigerette
the dlf lights...an eye sore
place for elite unthinking insensitive crowds
but this terrace was solely for us
i felt like a king of the world
with you beside me
you laughed and told me to study
thats what you always did
study
loads of things to do in life
as if i had none...
as if running up to see you and spend time with you
left me not working myself..
as if...but love,
i keep my work aside with a clean head
because i donot want to think while im there
its rest time
indulging the brain to fly and unravel
in its empty glory
you refused to hold my hand last night
you refused to even look
let alone make love
you refused to...
a tiny fear which had bubbled up burst inside
and i turned away to face the wall
atleast it looked back at me
unlike you

i know you will not understand
you're not meant to.
still i love you.
i always have.
yours
oyn.

iNKED

When was the first time you held an ink pen? They taught me to hold an ink pen in class 4. Blue “chelpark” ink with an “artic fountain pen” with a big silver-golden coloured nib. I didn’t even know how to hold it, sometimes I would grip it too tightly lest it fell from my hand and as a result I came back home with perforated pages in my notebooks and a broken nib much to my mother’s desperation. And sometimes I would grip it too lightly resulting in faint cursive lines which I myself would be unable to read by the time I opened the notebooks at night! But learning to write was fun. 


We possibly were a class of … I don’t really remember, there were 4 double rows and 7 benches in each row, so possibly a total of 56 boys and girls – oh yes, we had boys till class 4. We had the entire boy brigade right from kindergarten and there were regular outflows from both the sections each year into the don bosco school nearby. But a handful remained with us till class 4, and then like dinosaurs they disappeared without much reason and rhyme J my class teacher Miss Connie Francis was very strict. 


The sweetest teacher I ever had was Miss Neeta Choudhury in KG, and after she left school , I never saw her again. Class 4 was a time for terror, because the class was in the senior building and the feeling ran high that we were already into the senior block…only house colours remained to be distributed and then after, we were to be dedicated soldiers for our houses alone. but deviating from the ink part, I suddenly remembered that each day after amateurish ink attempts most of us, except the goody goody ones, (and oh there were some very dis-likable good kids in class) Dear God , how I despised them. 


It was precisely because of this tiny horrendous population, I was scared to sit beside my mother in front of the scrutinizing eyes of the teachers at the “parent- teacher’s meetings”, where poor mum was tortured with tales of me which turned her ears red. Kids my age, if they weren’t naughty, well… I wouldn’t like to be all prim and proper… There’s an age to be naughty and an age to be all prim and proper, now that I’ve been there and done that I know) had a sizable amount of ink on their clean white shirts, on their ties, on their handkerchiefs ( though Miss Connie was very particular about ink erasers and blotting papers, the quickest way was to blot it with your own hanky or anyone else’s a girl called Shakuntala Pathak had an enormous supply of blotting papers somewhere in her magnetic pencil box, and by the time she had finished blotting her leaky pen and her equally leaky written class work before submitting, the entire class helped themselves to her supplies, and few of us helped ourselves to extra pieces to make proper fighter planes) 


The palpable proof of rigorous hard work and studious effort was seen by the parents when the kids went home stained from finger to shirt with blue ink, who would have the heart to shout at these innocent Angels drenched in ink ??

When The Clock Struck Thirteen

Some of the most memorable books in one's lives are forgotten by the time they grow old. i remember when i was in class 3,  we did not have the permission to go to the school library. the library was meant for classes 5 to 10 only and it was so tempting to peep into the huge room with so many brown polished cupboards , a gateway to the books of all the famous authors in one place! ande for that one had to wait till they were promoted to class 5! its scary, what if i failed a year suddenly? it would mean the library doors would remain closed to me for even a greater period of time... 


my class 3 teacher was Mrs Valsa Anthony , she used to give out thin coloured children's storybooks to us each wednesday after class was over from a cupboard at the back of the class beside which we used to line up our bags and bottles. there was a boy called shrey who used to always spill water and the class used to tease him saying - oh shrey - you have WETTED the floor again! i fondly remember a book, by the name of "the clock struck thirteen". i donot remember the author at all, because i did not know that one had to even read the author's name, as logically for a child, it was a storybook she was holding and only the story inside the book seemed important to her. the story was about a boy and his family and the world that surrounded him . he did not believe in magic and one day, he lay awake to find out that after midnight the clock in the tower struck thirteen times, suddenly everything changed all around him and he was filled with a mesmerizing sense of charm and magic all around him. i remember the cover vividly too. it was a figure of the boy in pale blue against the dark night sky with a barn in the background and a clocktower where the hands of the clock was showing 13, studded with a sheen of stars giving it a haunting look.


 i never came across this book ever in my life and in my sheer excitement of wanting to share the magic with my classmates i had eagerly traded the book with some other fantasy tale. that was my first taste of magic, without a magician, without a wand or even a spell book... but it haunts me even today. The melodrama queen of hopes and foolish dreams that i am, still believe that this same magic which struck me at such a young age, brings me back that book some day. i would love to read through it again. we tend to forget many things in life, good memories we keep and disturbing ones we force back to the back of our heads. this is one memory which will stay with me forever. its a direct link to my childhood. i want to be awake too when the clock strikes thirteen the next time.

Race

As you know and i do
this year is about to end in June
the dry summer will be drier still
when i will leave against my will...
of this winter chill i love the air
i let the wind kiss back my hair
its icy cold, but i do not care
once this is gone 
the truth will be too much to bear


As i know and you do too
my throat grows parched
at the thought of you...
the seconds tick their time away
a deadline set in the month of may
its one race i will never win,
its one silent plea amidst the din,
its one heartbreak,
its one lost match,
its one budding story
that will never hatch.

A solitary lamp

...

remember that night 

of colors so bright

in darkness we lay

with a lamp giving us light..

i hated the day

but i loved the dawn

in your arms, my dear

in your arms so strong...

remember that night

of crackers and cake

of young souls and ghouls

all taking a break..

i loved the dark

i loved when stars came

but i loved it best

when you whispered my name...

remember next day

when you were asleep

i woke up long before

making memories to keep

i gazed at your lips

i gazed with sheer love

closed my eyes for a prayer

to the heavens above

but you opened your eyes

to glance at my stare

to cross a warm finger

along my long hair...

my heart stopped in place

it ceased to strike right...

you pulled me closer

with a scrumptious delight...

i mumbled and fumbled

my words were all wrong

you swirled me and twirled me

and sang me your song...