Who can ‘comfort’ like this?

Samantha again. This is a poem she wrote, but I am just eliminating the line-breaks (the capitalized words mark those breaks) and reading it again and again, wondering how one can be so straight and simple and yet so effective with words

Here Beside me Lay yourself down Where the sheets Grow cold Lay yourself down The day It is over Exhale a sound Relief escaping Let it go And, lay down Your head Needing rest All day it did pound Lay it here On my breast Lay your head down. My heart Can you hear it? Talking you down Off your ledge Calming heartbeat Beckons you down Here Beside me Lay yourself down Surrender To comfort Lay yourself down            ~smj

Added this after discovering that searching for Joanie/Gestaltist is leading me nowhere

Firstly it was Glandheim …

And now Joanie you too! You deleted your blog! Cannot do this, cannot do this to your readers! You never understand that reading also means, sometimes at least, that we care. You were not entertaining us merely. At least you could have stopped posting, but you should have left the blog like that, memories cannot be erased just if you want to, one should not have the audacity of doing so!

Condemned to be born

Immortal, condemned to be born, I want to die someday in your arms
I need you, need you, need you, as long my blood-lethe runs;
Moments fleet like a lifetime, I am an eyeless zombeing on
Images from a yesterlife, return of a prodigal son
Urban breeze breathing over the skins of verses littering on the ground
I need you, need you, need you, as long I remain the immortal one …

Your man is gone in an unknown mission: I don’t know where I’m heading to
Peneloping, stitching shreds of time and night-time unraveling: that is you;
Or Orpheusinging, I am bringing your being back from heaven to earth
Condemned to turn once: the sun’s flashdance! you are gone again, I am cursed
The urban breeze whistles a tune of tease as the skull-with-a-face sing and mourn
I will die once more in a street alone and instantly condemned to be born …

The streets pick up newer names, as I gather newer poems, I surf the faces in the crowd
You can’t recall me, I am still waiting, my face is fated to be found;
The tale is told again, like a teardrop after rain (in a disdained window-pane) breaking in its weight
The same old burn-out, the same old love-shroud, the same old deja-vu with my fate
An urban breeze whispers that this release is just one lifetime less than what I knew
As long I am condemned to be born yet again I need you, need you, I need you

I need you just the way I did in my bygone lives, the way I pleaded: please please eagle-girl
Come pick my eyes, as you did before, like shells on beaches; the waves unfurled
Will witness my eyes burning again as they find my angel blooming ahead
Love is blood-rose, petals and thorns, we will paint the cities red
Jamming traffic, we will lock lips, taste the hemlock, blissful sin
Urban gray-sky will receive earthlight from our kisses: Love is green

Skybound you are too to bleach with azure hue the canvas of your firmament
I am your dream, I am just a scream, ripping split open your existence
When you’re blue again, sadness is my name, you are taking me as your man
Ploughing your land I am born again, I am the carnival your king has banned
I will be hunted down, sentenced by the crown; but since I’m just the king’s devil’s own
I need you, need you, and I need you, as long I remain the immortal one …

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This poem started being a translation of an unforgettable Bengali song, Jatismar, composed by Kabir Suman, Bengal’s Dylan and Bengal’s Cohen rolled into one unique genius and a major formative influence on me. But the song is untranslatable with its richness of allusions to indigenous myths and a repertoire of Bengal’s rich poetic register. Therefore my attempt turned out to be another poem altogether.

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