Hassanal Abdullah [Bangladesh / USA]

 

The Siren
 
The smell of gunpowder approaches
as the siren of the third world war is heard;
frightened are the people and the birds,
the trees, the sky, and the earth:
I will not go to your war—not now.
 
I have spoken much of food,
spoken of multinational lamentations,
of rivers of blood—
and now I am terribly weary from
speaking of such slaughter.
You did not listen.
 
With flames in your eyes,
you produced gunpowder;
you split the atom,
and sold the poison of agony.
I have spoken often of flowers.
I have described the shimmering flow of rivers,
praised the beauty of blue skies,
like the restless tidewater,
and laid our pain and weariness
in golden letters of poetry.
 
I have traced the cries of newborns, tirelessly,
across the corners of this planet—
so that you might soften, even a little.
But your empires—
you have adorned them like dazzling teeth
with the glow of terrifying nuclear fire.
 
The wild siren of destruction blares through the air.
Gunpowder and power march side by side—swiftly.
The shattered agony of the first and second world wars
still lingers in the bosom of the earth.
It has not yet fully healed.
So once again,
I cast my vote for the child and the rose—
I will not go to your third war.
Not now, not ever.
 
(Translated from the Bengali by the Poet)
 

 
Time Falls Behind
 
I ask time to stay with me,
but, to my surprise,
I notice it gradually falls behind
as I go toward the east. Sometimes,
it lags so far that day becomes night,
and night turns into day.
Then I struggle with sleeping,
and eating at regular intervals.
My head starts pounding, and
my vision fades.
Even if an enemy comes near,
I mistake it for a friend.
My evening shifts into morning, and
morning becomes evening.
When I sit for breakfast, time in a bed,
keeps snoring at midnight.
It falls behind again and again. I try to
adjust my clock, giving time enough chances
to stay with me, but
it slowly drifts farther from my need.
It falls behind.
 
(Translated from the Bengali by the poet)
 
 

Erase Me
 
1.
Erase me from your page,
delete me from everywhere.
 
I want to fade away like
the bubbles of the sea,
I want to disappear like
a straw in a storm.
Erase me from your face,
delete me from everywhere.
 
Becoming a speck of dust,
I want to merge with the endless dust
of infinite space.
I want to drift away like
a piece of cotton.
Erase me from your stage,
delete me from everywhere.
 
2.
At three in the morning,
as it left without giving me a hint,
I have not seen sleep since.
I stretch and rise
to sit on the bed.
 
The steady sound of the ceiling fan
blocks out all noise from outside,
yet the monotonous snoring
from the bed beside mine
tells me I am not alone in this city.
 
Though we love to speak
of the twists and turns of poetry,
and chat about the percentage
of liquor in our glasses,
we, in fact, are
always self-absorbed.
 
(Translated from the Bengali by the poet) 
 
 

 
Author’s Bionote:
 
*Hassanal Abdullah is a Bangladeshi-American poet, novelist, critic, and song writer. He is a sonnet form innovator (seven-seven stanza pattern and abcdabc efgdefg rhyming scheme) and the author of an epic on cosmology. His poetry has been translated into eighteen languages and was published in many anthologies and magazines around the world. He has been invited to international poetry festivals in China, Greece, Guatemala, Indian, Indonesia, Kenya, Macedonia, Mexico, Morocco, and Poland. He edited World Poetry Anthology (Darklight Publishing, 2023) and translated Contemporary Bangladeshi Poetry (CCC, 2019). His own Collected Poems (Ananya, 2019) in Bengali published in two volumes. Mr. Abdullah is a retired NYC High School math teacher and the editor of Shabdaguchha since 1998. He received five international poetry awards, including the Homer European Medal (2016). He was also awarded a translation grant (2019) from New York City Cultural Affairs. Hassanal Abdullah is the author of 62 books in various genres.