6 August 1983
Maheshkhali, Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh
Niloy Rafiq has been writing in the literary pages of local daily newspapers since his school days. Later, his poems were published in national and international literary magazines including various little magazines. So far, his notable poems have been translated into more than twenty foreign languages. His English poetry book `Sunleaf’ has already been published by `Amazon’. The number of his poetry books written in Bengali language is 6 respectively 1. I, the swan float in pure sadness, 2. Thirst’s eternity, 3. Salty man’s face, 4. Unknown fire, 5. Adinath in eyes, 6. Wax prayer bowed in a clay body. His poetry has a magical, edgy feeling. Poet Niloy Rafiq is like a magician in the extraordinary weaving of words and rhythms.
SONADWIP THE GOLDEN ISLAND
Fire particles in the sweet betel leaf, stitching mountains
The tree of mind wails due to eviction
Sonadwip is in the trap of ancient fragrance
The vagabond’s address is missing on the way.
Bloodthirsty ones under masks create the deceptive foams
A dream of Paris isn’t so far away, reds and blues in the eyes!
Water flowers are helpless, faces are covered with shame
The childhood sports are now memories like the fallen leaves.
All around flamboyancies and barbaric fires
Old roots are burned to ashes, uproars of crying!
The land of sleeping is in an impure, unknown land
No one’s there, gestures are dumb, eyes are of course blurry.
THE MUTACHHARA CHANNEL
Two heroes are in beautiful plunders in the battlefield
On the Mount Mainak, fighting for victory in the time mirror
The god’s questionnaire, the pleas of Shiva
Lanka swings on Ravana’s tireless shoulders.
A window rooted in pure ascetic meditation
Thunders from the natural sky on the way to follow
The mind’s dream was broken when the charioteer urinated!
The sunflowers in the flying palace drowned in saltwater.
Life is invisible in the Mahadev Hill
A pair of pools for baptising the sacred body
In the prayers placing forehead on the soil of destiny
The pilgrimage to Adinath is a bridge of virtue.
Lobsters are in Mutachhara, the channel of Ravana’s urine
Their delicious ambrosia-like broth sooths the heart.
Translated by Jyotirmoy Nandy
THE BELLICOSE
What is the meaning of humanity? A march of deaths!
Tender roses fall down in the door of fate,
Red maps are drawn by the Krishnachura flowers.
The Middle Age is inside the hole, the barbarism of the early ages
The world is divided into two parts in the rampage of bloodthirsty monsters
Today the human beings are just spectators in the playground.
A class of humanity is resounded
In the protests of dreamers—we want peace, stop against the dreamer
The pain of separation! Let the peace come back.
The looters kill in cold blood, draw dreams
In a cup of wine with an exultation
Let everything burn in the fire and drown in the blood bath
Let the war spread all around…
The window of the empire simpers!
Translated by: Jyotirmoy NANDY
