Conversation within parenthesis
red clouds
form
as the city burns; i think of how our conversation
would unfold –
26 people have died
in a fire tragedy in Banani;
211 shops in Gulshan-1 market:
completely
razed
in fire; and in-between we wouldn’t forget
the refugee crises around the world
come back to road accidents
which claim
so many lives,
etc, etc and filler stories to frown at desperately –
all of it
which transform the global narrative
of our homeland.
i have learned to tailor our conversations
in silence, in different shades of colours
while listening to Nazrul (read out loud
by someone more competent)
to Ginsberg
going on and on about how America has failed
the world; its people
(to other poets i can’t or won’t name, lest this gets analysed).
let’s go beyond the humid nature
of our concrete lives, you might say in a tired response
to materialise the spatio-temporal cadence
of what is newsworthy.
this poem is about us
and the stories which break to make us
“concerned citizens”.
this poem is about us
with drying eyes and pens, solid.
and nimble fingertips on keyboards, liquefied.
the red clouds are fuming
now
becoming even darker-
shades of our epic tragedies;
suffocated in word limits.
S, the abstract in this poem who dabbles in the ruins
to find the solution; to end human tragedy
just so politicians swallow the foams from around their lying mouths;
S, the protagonist of my poetry who births magic
in the incomplete drafts… into completion;
S, the calm before the world ceases to make sense
and the northern star to make sense of it all
see, now, here
the red clouds have become a quiet dusk,
you can morph it
into words,
be the author of a new day.