Shamsur Rahman: A poet of our soil and the world

Sketch: TBS

It has been seventeen years since Shamsur Rahman passed away on 17 August, 2006. He is a poet of our soil and indeed, a poet of the world. In his enormous tome of poetry, we can find the odyssey of Bangladesh's birth – its post-independence trauma with the loss of its epical hero Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and its later staggered journey. 

Once Rahman began his poetic pursuit in the 1950s, he never stopped. Humayun Azad, one of his leading critics, called him Nishanga Sherpa (Lonely Mountaineer) in the sense that, of his many poet comrades, it was he who reached the peak in the realm of Bangladeshi poetry. 

Rahman's poetry can be an interesting study for other nations, especially people who have similar histories of colonisation and struggle for freedom. 

Besides, Rahman is one of the leading writers championing love and humanity beyond time and space.  He has a considerable number of prose, including novels, essays, memoirs, juvenile fiction and translations. 

His writings inspire us to be humane. His writings are against cruelty in whatever form and shape it exists. However, so far, we have not been able to make Rahman adequately accessible to global readers in the medium of English. 

Here is my humble effort to present Rahman's two Bangla poems in English – one of the poems alludes to Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the other alludes to Rahman's teen-aged son Matin who died after drowning in their village pond.  

Poet Shamsur Rahman in his youth. Sketch: TBS

Great is that Man
'Dhanya Sei Purush' from the poetical work Abiram Jalbhrami, 1986

Great is that man – who comes out of a deep river– 
At the moment the sun is rising.
Great is that man who from the blue hill top
Comes down the carpet of green valley– 
Teeming with butterflies.
Great is that man who emerges from an autumnal beel 
Flying myriad-coloured birds.
Great is that man who, after a famine, rushes out 
from a harrowing field 
With dreams of harvesting crops. 

Blessed are we, sure.
We see that you still keep coming from a distant horizon 
And we anxiously wait for you 
As if we are thirsty deer in hot grisma noon 
Looking for water. 

Piercing your bosom the blood-red jaba has bloomed like pride 
And we stare at those flowers. 
Our eyes do not want to blink 
Our guilt-ridden traumatic heads droop down. 

Look, one by one, all are treading the wrong path– 
A sheer downfall!
Like a disco dancer they have started dancing at Manisha's Minar 
Sending their conscience into oblivion. 

Trustworthiness is now digging holes, hidden 
For those who are good.
Facts are falling apart like potters' broken earthen pots. 
The flatterers' lips are so fluent, 
Profusely producing words, days and nights. 
Look, some fruit trees are loaded with makal fruits.
Love and affection are drying like burnt grass 
Look, today, there is no difference between crows and cuckoos.
Using countless tricks and excuses 
The tricksters are embellishing a tyrant's head with a crown.

Look, none of the head is able to rise 
Even a little higher than your knee-height, 
By no means none could exceed that height.
Losing you was like evening shadows– 
Slowly melting into darkness.
Our days were shrouded with grief. 

Separated from you, in days of crisis, 
We were lamenting sitting in our dunghills. 
Our lament made the sky grief-stricken 
But you have transformed that grief into life's hymn
Because we know that you are more living than the living.

Great is that man, on whose name shines the sun 
For ever, Sraban's rain, like music, pours on this name  
Winds never allow dust to amass on this name.
Great is that man on whose name the moonbeam-cranes  
Spread their wings 
Great is that man on whose name swings our Freedom like the flag.
Great is that man on whose name 
Echoes the ecstasy of our Freedom Fighters. 
 

A Photograph
'Ekti Photograph' from the poetical work Ek Phota Kemon Anal, 1986
Do come in, please! Come in! 
And what's up?
You're fine, sure! How about the kids? 
After a small talk–
Pointing at the still photograph on the white wall 
I said to my questioning guest,
"This is my youngest son who is no more, 
Like a piece of stone 
He drowned in our village pond. 
About three years from now, at a crow-cawing grisma noon."

How easily had I narrated this!
My throat did not tremble a bit
No sigh heaved up ripping my heart
Eyes did not moisten with tears.   
I am startled to hear my own voice. 
What indifference! How cold!
Three years from now– only three years–
Once how I weaved a deep sorrow!
Meanwhile, which malevolence has turned 
My mourning-river into a dreary char So fast? 
As the guest left, I stood again
Before the photograph's curious eyes 
With waning grief
From inside the frame, my son keeps gazing without a wink
His gaze, devoid of any anger or abhiman.

Md Abu Zafor is a professor at the Department of English, Jagannath University

1 Grisma is the hottest season in Bangladesh.
2 Char in Bangladesh is the landmasses formed through the sedimentation of huge amount of sand, silt and clay over time carried by big rivers.  
3 This Bangla word has hardly any equivalence in English. It is sort of like 'a silent protest of anger'.