The Heartless

Addressing me as Stone, People often scold me now. The poor peasants lament everyday Calling me Waste Land. Calling me Burnt Field, The golden shepherd of the rising sun Goes back in search of green grass. The broken winged drunk bees lament Calling me Paper Flower. Women create the storm of condemnation In the night's erotic air Calling me Sapless Wood. Once at a spring afternoon, The varsity going girl Naoroj Looking like a ripe Chalta Offered me a red Iranian rose, saying: 'Red rose greetings to you, o my first man! ' No sooner had I grasped that rose of good luck Than all its petals, like dry leaves, fell down on the dust. That love-seeking pea-hen girl was blown in shock Like Orpheus's lyre. Then grasping the hand of Evening, She went back crying in the pompous star-fair Of the lustrous youth. While bathing in the village pond named Chinigola Dighi, I often had the chance to meet Thakur family's Basona Boudidi. Washing cloths on the ghat of the Dighi, She often asked me, 'What's the matter, Thakurpo? Why don't you marry? ' Saying so, She burst out into laughter bowing down head Like the insane moon of Summer. Once in a wicked evening, I came out of home For walking. Suddenly, emerging from somewhere Storm and Rain chased me like a mad dog. Running, I took shelter in Basona Boudi's Ghost-like home. My whole body was trembling in cold. Swapanda, her husband, said, 'Stay the night here today.' I was given the guest room to sleep. In the incessant rain, I fell asleep fast. When the night became graveyard, Basona Boudi pushed me aside Whispering 'Thakurpo! Thakurpo! ' On the naked corridor of the room full of darkness, We got obsessed in playing ferociously The primitive game of lust. Getting defeated in that horrible forbidden wrestling, She turned mad. Grasping me tightly like pincers On the high hills of her sweet smelling bosom, She said, 'Flee somewhere this night Taking me for ever with you.' She started weeping like the clouds of the Monsoon Setting her head on my chest. But, alas, Keeping ears on the lifeless cactus of my bosom She became timber in fear: 'What a horror! Why can't I hear the throbbing of your heart? ' Then she rushed in fear with her ghostly heart To the intolerable room of her destiny. While seeing me now, Basona Boudidi says, 'You are the burnt wood of the pyre.' While seeing me now, Basona Boudidi fills the adverse air Calling me 'Heartless! Heartless! ' O Afroza, how do I tell her, I had only one heart, Stealing that heart of mine, you fled away like Eurydice In the first Spring of my life!