Dibyendu's WallScript

On the last day of the festival, Arpita, I beheld thee— behind the veil of thy hair, thine eyes did shine, like basil leaves anointed with sandal, pressed gently upon thy sacred form.   Now, when the harvest of paddy is ended, and the sweet rice lies steaming upon the veranda, thou walkest the path of milk, and I stretch my gaze as far as the eyes can wander, for in thy shape I see the gentle cow, pierced by its own horn of destiny.   In this land of the Mother-river, where exiles love the road more than the home, lightnings of longing gather in their hearts; upon the endless streets of swelling cities, lovers stand in rows, afflicted by fevers of desire.   Doubt awakes in me, for in thy silent breath the breast doth rise and fall; in thine oblique glance is irony and pride. This earth is not mine, I know it well— and unto him to whom thou gavest thy soul, thou art Arpita.   Or is it I who, pouring lemon’s sour into sugar, have wasted life in hypocrisy? This soil bel...

The opinions of class war and revolution, armed frenzy, fury, peasant uprisings, death camps, purges, civil unrest and change— where your shadow falls across my life, is that a sign of joy? Surely some hypocrisy lies within.   Opposing opinions, our communal orders— you speak with your tongue, while I hold on to my labor. Your feet climb my highest horn— what darker day could yet arrive?   Why does it take courage for gun and glory, while these dividers measure the world with sickle or hammer, and if they behead the thinker, is the world so much diminished?   On the dead body falls the dripping mark of central control; yet the mind of a free man they still search for endlessly.   My foolish head, reading ideologies, like an idiot turns the pages of power— and still man believes, still man loves to think. Will thought be halted by tickling provocation?   The hammer strikes, and the share of the plough becomes the sickle. Ah, if only I could love you instead, if o...