Pagla Dashu

My heart aches,
Aches for the great men of my motherland,
Who wrought well the alphabets of our culture.
My heart aches,
For the loss of the men who crafted for us the boats
to sail in the sea of imagination.
The men who in their slumber awaken the spirit of
pride which grows on further than the Himalayas and
is stretched out wider than the Plateau of Deccan -
Hark! The tales of men who in their non nonsensical ways
and our whimsical ways, made sense when nobody else did.
Kneeling down to their spirit, I evoke them in my mind
as to god, one would - devoted in their prayers - Men who did not
roam the world but lived it - not lived the world but made it.
Their blood flowing under the veins of frozen ink,
flowing, and beating,
the heart - like mine but only greater, only gentler.
Their souls too strong, too heavy to be contained by vessel earth,
that heaven was built for them.
And as I close my eyes today,
My heartbeat singing an ode to these men -
will sound the anthem that they wrote.
Hark! For they speak now, and I, like a worshiper -
Chant their names.

- In memory of the great Sukumar Ray.