স্মৃতি (কবি: সুনীল গঙ্গোপাধ্যায়)

বাল্যকালে একটা ছিল বিষম সুখ

তখন কোনো বাল্যকালের স্মৃতি ছিল না

স্মৃতি আমায় কাঁটার মতন বেঁধে

আমায় নির্জনতায়

চক্ষু বেঁধে ঘোরায়

স্মৃতি আমায় শাসন করে

ঘুমের ঘোরে স্বপ্ন ভাঙায়

আমার কিছু ভালো লাগে না

জন্ম গেল আকণ্ঠ এক

তৃষ্ণা নিয়ে

জন্ম থেকেই কেউ এলো না

বাল্যকালে একটা ছিল বিষম সুখ

তখন কোনো বাল্যকালের স্মৃতি ছিল না

When I am Among the Trees (by Mary Oliver)

 When I am among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness.

I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,

in which I have goodness, and discernment,

and never hurry through the world

but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves

and call out, “Stay awhile.”

The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, “It's simple,” they say,

“and you too have come

into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled

with light, and to shine.”

Love's Philosophy (by Percy Bysshe Shelley)

The fountains mingle with the river

And the rivers with the ocean,

The winds of heaven mix for ever

With a sweet emotion;

Nothing in the world is single;

All things by a law divine

In one spirit meet and mingle.

Why not I with thine?—

See the mountains kiss high heaven

And the waves clasp one another;

No sister-flower would be forgiven

If it disdained its brother;

And the sunlight clasps the earth

And the moonbeams kiss the sea:

What is all this sweet work worth

If thou kiss not me?

The True Love (by David Whyte)

There is a faith in loving fiercely

the one who is rightfully yours,

especially if you have

waited years and especially

if part of you never believed

you could deserve this

loved and beckoning hand

held out to you this way.

I am thinking of faith now

and the testaments of loneliness

and what we feel we are

worthy of in this world.

Years ago in the Hebrides,

I remember an old man

who walked every morning

on the grey stones

to the shore of baying seals,

who would press his hat

to his chest in the blustering

salt wind and say his prayer

to the turbulent Jesus

hidden in the water,

and I think of the story

of the storm and everyone

waking and seeing

the distant

yet familiar figure

far across the water

calling to them

and how we are all

preparing for that

abrupt waking,

and that calling,

and that moment

we have to say yes,

except it will

not come so grandly

so Biblically

but more subtly

and intimately in the face

of the one you know

you have to love

so that when

we finally step out of the boat

toward them, we find

everything holds

us, and everything confirms

our courage, and if you wanted

to drown you could,

but you don’t

because finally

after all this struggle

and all these years

you simply don’t want to

any more

you’ve simply had enough

of drowning

and you want to live and you

want to love and you will

walk across any territory

and any darkness

however fluid and however

dangerous to take the

one hand you know

belongs in yours.

Kindness (by Naomi Shihab Nye)

Before you know what kindness really is

you must lose things,

feel the future dissolve in a moment

like salt in a weakened broth.

What you held in your hand,

what you counted and carefully saved,

all this must go so you know

how desolate the landscape can be

between the regions of kindness.

How you ride and ride

thinking the bus will never stop,

the passengers eating maize and chicken

will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness

you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho

lies dead by the side of the road.

You must see how this could be you,

how he too was someone

who journeyed through the night with plans

and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,

you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.

You must wake up with sorrow.

You must speak to it till your voice

catches the thread of all sorrows

and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,

only kindness that ties your shoes

and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,

only kindness that raises its head

from the crowd of the world to say

It is I you have been looking for,

and then goes with you everywhere

like a shadow or a friend.

The Garden of Proserpine (by Algernon Charles Swinburne)

Here, where the world is quiet;

         Here, where all trouble seems

Dead winds' and spent waves' riot

         In doubtful dreams of dreams;

I watch the green field growing

For reaping folk and sowing,

For harvest-time and mowing,

         A sleepy world of streams.

I am tired of tears and laughter,

         And men that laugh and weep;

Of what may come hereafter

         For men that sow to reap:

I am weary of days and hours,

Blown buds of barren flowers,

Desires and dreams and powers

         And everything but sleep.

Here life has death for neighbour,

         And far from eye or ear

Wan waves and wet winds labour,

         Weak ships and spirits steer;

They drive adrift, and whither

They wot not who make thither;

But no such winds blow hither,

         And no such things grow here.

No growth of moor or coppice,

         No heather-flower or vine,

But bloomless buds of poppies,

         Green grapes of Proserpine,

Pale beds of blowing rushes

Where no leaf blooms or blushes

Save this whereout she crushes

         For dead men deadly wine.

Pale, without name or number,

         In fruitless fields of corn,

They bow themselves and slumber

         All night till light is born;

And like a soul belated,

In hell and heaven unmated,

By cloud and mist abated

         Comes out of darkness morn.

Though one were strong as seven,

         He too with death shall dwell,

Nor wake with wings in heaven,

         Nor weep for pains in hell;

Though one were fair as roses,

His beauty clouds and closes;

And well though love reposes,

         In the end it is not well.

Pale, beyond porch and portal,

         Crowned with calm leaves, she stands

Who gathers all things mortal

         With cold immortal hands;

Her languid lips are sweeter

Than love's who fears to greet her

To men that mix and meet her

         From many times and lands.

She waits for each and other,

         She waits for all men born;

Forgets the earth her mother,

            The life of fruits and corn;

And spring and seed and swallow

Take wing for her and follow

Where summer song rings hollow

         And flowers are put to scorn.

There go the loves that wither,

         The old loves with wearier wings;

And all dead years draw thither,

         And all disastrous things;

Dead dreams of days forsaken,

Blind buds that snows have shaken,

Wild leaves that winds have taken,

         Red strays of ruined springs.

We are not sure of sorrow,

         And joy was never sure;

To-day will die to-morrow;

         Time stoops to no man's lure;

And love, grown faint and fretful,

With lips but half regretful

Sighs, and with eyes forgetful

         Weeps that no loves endure.

From too much love of living,

         From hope and fear set free,

We thank with brief thanksgiving

         Whatever gods may be

That no life lives for ever;

That dead men rise up never;

That even the weariest river

         Winds somewhere safe to sea.

Then star nor sun shall waken,

         Nor any change of light:

Nor sound of waters shaken,

         Nor any sound or sight:

Nor wintry leaves nor vernal,

Nor days nor things diurnal;

Only the sleep eternal

         In an eternal night.