Chapter: 1
I was nourished in a family where education was adored as a holy thing. My mother taught me how to show honour to a book, even to a detached page of a book, what kind of book it was, was not the matter. All kinds of books were holy books to us because no mean type of book or unbecoming book had any chance to reach our home in that beautiful calm sweet-breathing village. Francis Bacon said that people are of three types: those who are very simple, admire the books; the cunning, condemn them; the wise, use them. We were not wise people at all; but we were the true admirers of books. Many a day I have seen my mother offering alms to the beggars, especially rice collected from our own fields, if ever any book happened to fall down from our hands. Not only that, instantly we picked up the book from the ground and kissed its cover-page again and again. Still now I do it when the same thing happens to any book I hold. Modern men may consider it superstition; but this superstition helped me become a lover of books.
All the words written in a book I found near my hand during my childhood days were like the tasty foods. I devoured them all with a great appetite. Whatever the fuel is, if it comes ever to a fire, it gets burnt because the nature of fire is that it spares none. It is cruel; but through this cruelty, light is born to charm the eyes of the onlookers. My father collected books for me, carried them at home and my mother made me learn how to deal with them with fear and honour.
Throughout my whole life, I was nothing but a poet. I was born as a poet because a poet can never be made, he is born. And a poet means nothing but a fire. But I was then the hidden fire within the wood. One day I was suddenly kindled while reading an essay on our great Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. I was then only 11. But a fire need not have any age. Fire is ferocious at any age; it looks for an opportunity to be kindled, and if once kindled, it starts burning everything it gets nearby. Going through the essay, when I came to know that Rabindranath started writing poems at his 8, I became frustrated, envious and furious for being so late to start. Three years had already passed leaving me far behind. I became shocked as if I had been in a race to compete with Rabindranath. However, getting furious, I started running and that race of mine is still going on. This way I was kindled and thus I have been burning incessantly since that day of my 11th year.
Chapter: 2
Every incident of life in the past seems to be dramatic and miraculous now. How I dared to compete with a gigantic poet like Rabindranath at that very stage of my primary school-life is still a wonder to me. I have mused over it many a time to find out the reasons. Two reasons might cause against such an ambition: one is, discovering Rabindranath’s first composition of poem at the age of eight; second, an intolerable communal cnmment of a senior Hindu student of my high school on my nation. It accidently happened one day in my school while we, almost all the boys of all classes, were playing or gossiping in the playground during our leisure period. In those days, girls were not allowed to play or gossip with us; they passed their time by playing or gossiping in their large common room. However, a handful students of several classes including me were discussing on various topics on that day.
We, the boys, who were talking together standing at a place, were the most brilliant students of our school. All were the first boys. I was the youngest one among them, just promoted from class six to class seven. Gopalda was the tallest and senior one. Two years ago, he came in Bangladesh from India and started living permanently at his maternal uncle’s house. After joining in class nine, he stood first in all examinations defeating the former first boy Zahurulbhai. Gopalda was the most aged boy in the school and many students made fun with him addressing as Gopalchacha (‘Gopalda’ means ‘brother Gopal’ whereas ‘Gopalchacha’ means ‘uncle Gopal’) . I was given the award of the best student of the school for scoring the highest marks in the annual examination. That might cause jealousy in his mind. I was not aware of it. I often felt shy in front of him because of his seniority and agedness.
That day, without any obvious reason as far as I recollect, Gopalda suddenly started talking ill of the Muslims. He felt proud of his own nation. In his words: “The Hindus are greater than the Muslims.” Though small, I protested his words, “Not always, Gopalda.” He got irritated and said at a stretch with satirical tone, “Every time every where. In the field of science, we have Jagadish Chandra Bosu, who is yours? We have the great mathematician Jadab Chakraborti, have you any? We have Rabindranath Thakur, have you any? ” He divided us as the Hindu and the Muslim and specified me as a Muslim boy only. I got shocked, irritated and humiliated. Communalism breeds nothing but communalism itself; hurriedly it spreads and contaminates all who come with its touch. I tried to defend myself saying, “Why not, we have Nazrul and…”
He did not let me complete my speech. He interrupted me and asked with a horrible pride, “Our Rabindranath has got the Nobel Prize; has your Nazrul got? ” I became stunned, speechless and utterly dumb. I had nothing to say but to put up with the intolerable pain of humiliation standing in front of an aged communal Hindu boy. I felt like crying because I got defeated in the battle-field. My mind revolted; my anger burst within me like an atom bomb and I rushed from there like a wounded lion. I silently accused the Nobel committee of not awarding our great rebel poet Kazi Nazrul Islam.
Chapter: 3
Now my headache became only to become a big poet in the world. So I started writing which way Rabindranath had started. Rabindranath had written:
Jal pore
Pata nore.
I wrote:
Oi je mosha
Janlai bosa.
Competition continued. I used to compose 60-70 poems every day in order to outnumber Rabindranath’s. Rabindranath wrote:
Amsatya dudhe feli,
Tahate kadoli doil,
Sandesh makhia nia tate;
Hapus hupus shabdo,
Charidik nistabdo,
Pipra kadia jai pate.
But I could not compose any poem like that. I tried again and again but failed every time the same way. I failed because I had no knowledge in prosody. I was only aware of rhyme but I knew nothing about rhythm. That deficit could not intervene me from composing more and more poems.
Actually, I did not know that my poems were not becoming poems at all; only I could feel that those were not like Rabindranath’s. I sent my poems by post to the local newspapers. Among them, the Dainik Sphulingo and the Dainik Ranar were the remarkable ones. They published my poems with a great care. Collecting those newspapers I showed them to my teachers. They inspired me to write more and more. Several high school teachers of mine namely Mr. Sudhanno Kumar Mollik, Mr. Din Mohammad, Mr. Mosharraf Hosen and H. Rahman were very interested in my writing. Later, another teacher named Gazi Afsar Uddin came in our school who inspired me a lot too.
The most popular national daily of that time, the Ittefaq, was the official newspaper in our school. In this newspaper two literary pages were published two days in a week: pure literature on Thursday and juvenile as well as children literature on Friday. Two pages were edited by two famous poets: Thursday’s “Sahitya Samoiki” by Al Mujahidy and Friday’s “Kachi-Kachar Asor” by Rokonuzzaman Khan. My honorable teacher Sudhanno Kumar Mollik made me read these two pages punctually. He also made me read the major works of Rabindranath, Nazrul, Bankimchandra and Sharotchandra by providing books from the school-library. I acquired a minimum idea about our classic Bengali literature by reading those books. Besides, the literature published in the Ittefaq helped me have some idea about our modern literature including modern poetry, short story, essay and chhara (limerick) .
By this time, I became famous as a poet not only in my school but also in my locality. I started believing that like Nazrul, Modhusudon, Rabindranath or Jasimuddim, I am also a poet. Did Rabindranath alone provoke me to be a poet? Perhaps, that is not the whole truth. Another poet inspired me to be a poet too, not merely a simple poet, rather an epic-poet like him. He is Michael Modhusudon Dutt. We were born on the same soil. Same ambition, madness and patriotic zeal we bore within us. I did not know rhythm but I started composing sonnets with a miraculous power. A poem consisting of 14 lines having 14 letters in each line is called sonnet in Bengali. I built that Taj Mahal within few moments one after one; how? I did not know how and that made the general people surprised more and more about me. Now when I recollect those days, those incidents, those sonnets and poems that I have lost for ever, I feel ashamed of my idiocy. Truly Shakespeare said: there are three types of mads: poet, lover and madman. What is created on earth without madness?
Chapter: 4
The place where I was born and where I was growing up was wonderfully beautiful. It was like a picture drawn by a skilled artist. My every moment was full of delight there. My life was flooded with the celestial light. I was then like a krisnachura tree whose whole body and soul were full of flowers and fragrance. Nature and me became inseparable from each other. My eyes were charmed with the beauty of my small village, neibouring villages, their green fields, lily-bogs, lotus-ponds, deep dark lakes and the large blue sky; my mind often started dancing with joy and my pen produced poems after poems day and night. I was the devoted reader of those poems and read again and again with a great wonder. It seemed to me that I had already been a great poet though that foolish boy did not know that Mecca is very far and that beyond the blue sky, there lie many other skies.
Was that madness of composing poems childishly, a mere wastage of time? I do not think so. No struggle for any genuine goal goes futile ever. Those poems, though immature, unfruitful and meaningless, paved the way of my future success. Playing the day-night game with rhyme and words made me ready for the battle in future. Another thing which came out from this madness was that the horizons of my imagination, like magic-doors, were opened one after one.
However, I was writing without any interval and sending them by post office to the local newspapers and magazines and sometimes to national newspapers like the Dainik Bangla or the Ittefaq. One day I got a parcel from Muktagachha, Mymensing which contained two copies of a colourful magazine named “Moutusi”, in which one of my poems was published. The poem was published so gorgeously in green colour that my two eyes got dazzled. How many times a day I read that poem on the sly and got immense pleasure by showing it to my teachers and class-friends. I had preserved it many years though, in the long run, it got lost for ever and even I forgot not only any line of this poem but also its title. I got its address from the newspaper and sent a poem which was published later.
Another address I collected from somewhere and sent poem there too by post office. It was the address of a children magazine published from Agartala, Tripura. After one month, I got a post-card written by Chuni Das, the editor. The handwriting of Chunida was excellent, extra-ordinary, superb. His letter was full of my praise and it was sent to me just to inform that my poem was going to be published in the next issue. Timely I received the magazine, in which my poem was published. I was thrilled with this thought that my poem had ben published not only in Banhladesh but also in India. But how far is Dhaka, our capital city, the centre of Bengali language and Bengali literature? Why don’t they publish my poems there? I often asked myself and condoled myself too saying that great men were always neglected at their birth-place.
Chapter: 5
Did I only want to be a poet from my childhood? Many things I wanted to become. A child falls in love with all the things he finds new and lucrative and fights to have them in his possession. The same case started happening with me too. My father was a great dreamer; the dreams of various professions were emerged from his head and I hankered after them madly for a while and then I stopped. Only the dream, afterwhich my race never came to an end, was to be a poet, a banyan-like poet in the world. However, I wanted to be an army officer, a very powerful man like Ayub Khan, having a royal stick at hand, I would move and all would salute me, I would only nod my head. So I needed to get myself admitted into a cadet college first. While in class seven, I took leave for one month from my school. I was lodged in a cadet coaching centre in Jhenidah named Motalib Cadet Coaching. I stayed there with other students at night.
It was the first time I left home for education purpose. Though my stay at Motalib sir’s coaching was short as Sheuly or Daffodil flowers, it occupied a small room into my sweet memory. Within two days I was proved to be the most brilliant student among them. A test was taken on three subjects: Mathematics, English and General Knowledge; I stood first in that examination. All got suddenly interested in me. We were kept busy with our study round the clock day and night except our eating and sleeping hours. Before evening, we were given only 40 minutes for outing. But we did not go anywhere alone; a teacher who was our guide accompanied us wherever we went.
We stayed in a building beside the Dhaka-Jhenidah high way attached to nature, a little far from the Jhenidah town. It was the time of winter then. Beside our residence, there was spread a very long vast green field full of various types of crops and trees. Specially, tobacco, vegetables, wheat and banana-trees were seen to be cultivated here and there. When the golden moment of going outside arrived, we leaped like the fawns to get lost into the heart of fathomless heavenly beauty. My friends of that coaching centre and my teachers had no idea about my poetic power. I kept it hidden from their knowledge. Even I did not write any poem there, not only for lack of time but also for shyness. But I could not control myself while walking or running with my friends in open field full of green wonders. A boy named Sathi whose father was DC of Magura became very intimate with me. His memory was somewhat dull but nice a heart he possessed to befriend others easily. Looking at my excitement on the lap of nature, he often asked me which things made me so delighted. I did not know the answer. Only I remained silent pretending that I had not heard his question.
Truly, it is the beauty of Nature which made me a poet first. The beauty of my birth-place Jessore is the most attractive one in my eyes. My eyes became ever blind with her beauty which way a lover’s eyes become blind with his beloved. Jhenidah is the second district in my life which attracted me with colour, scent and taste. Still those several days of my boyhood in Jhenidah make me nostalgic that I can’t forget ever. My stay in Jhenidah came to an end within one month. After participating in the written examination, I left Jhenidah bag and baggage and went back to my high school. But my mind was in Jhenidah and I was eagerly waiting for my admission result.
My admission result was published on time and I was called for viva voce examination. All became happy for my success in the written examination and my dream to be a cadet as well as an army officer made me fly like a kite in the sky of ambition. My father carried me to Jhenidah Cadet College again. My performance in viva voce examination was not bad but I became disqualified in the medical test; what was my fault was unknown to me. So I was ousted from the list of final result, all my sweet dreams broke down like a sand-barrage and I returned home with a broken heart like a defeated soldier in the battle-filed. But I did not know what a wonder was awaiting me in my old school which I wanted to forsake for ever.
Chapter: 6
Whenever I have failed to achieve anything in my life, it is poetry to whom I have returned for solace and security. It started happening in my life from my very boyhood. Having failed to get admitted into cadet college, whether I cried or not is not in my memory now; but freshly I can remember that all the members of my family felt very sad and condoled me not to get worried. But I severely I got worried and did not go to school for one week. These days I confined myself into my own room and got obsessed with composing poems after poems. I composed new poems and recited alone to soothe my ears. When I got tired with composting poems, I left my room for Nature and walked slowly hours after hours in our green fields. I have always seen that the soft, innocent, lovely touch of Nature has cured my mind like a medicine in all my mental crises and sufferings. I heard the name of William Wordsworth after many years but miraculosly I was a Wordsworth in my boyhood. The life and fate of a born-poet, an original poet, in any corner of this beautiful earth is always same.
Like all other village girls and boys, I used to go to school on foot. My children cannot now imagine how much we the village students in those days struggled with hard labour to have education from our schools. My own high school named Garvanga High School was about two miles far from our house. So I had to walk nearly four miles every day, two miles to go and two miles to return. Besides, the the village-roads were very rough and muddy. The road, through which I was to go to school, was very zig-zag and it ran through the green fields. During the rainy season, the fields got utterly filled with green paddy and long jute plants, our school going narrow path became dark and while going through that path on foot, it seemed that we were going through a jungle-path. Going alone through this path was undoubtedly one kind of adventure. How many days I felt frightened while crossing a particular place of this path beside a dark pond named `Kanadighi’. It was a large deep pond surrounded by thick bushes. The colour of its water was deep black. Panic seized me while walking alone I looked at its ghostly water. Who dug this pond into the heart of desolate fields and how many days ago it was dug was unknown to me. I never saw any body bathing, swimming or catching fish in this pond. Still it remains as a mysterious pond into the annals of my childhood.
During the rainy season, we carried our shoes at hand and reaching near our school we washed our mud-covered feet in the pond. Then we entered our school. When after one week’s interval I reached my school and entered my classroom, my class friends welcomed me. I always sat on the first bench of the class because I was the first boy in the class and all the first boys of all classes (I never saw any girl to be first here)were accustomed to sit traditionally at the beginning of the first bench.
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