You bring out the Bengali in me!

This is for all the the Bengalis – actually I came across a poem by Sandra Cisnero – ” You bring out the Mexican in me” which prompted me to write this lines over a small shot of Mojito 🙂 Some of the parts are in bengali. I have seen other variations also like You bring out the UP walli and another one The Maritan in me – and all of them are cool!  Enjoy…

You bring out the bengali in me
You bring out the poet in me
The musical mother tongue
The playing with words in me
The scholar in me,
The nerd in me
The accented english in me
The know-all attitude in me

You bring out the bengali in me
The road side debates in me
The aantel with side-bag in me
The coffee-house adda in me
The art critic in me
The babuana in me
The rainy-day saver in me
The bazaar-negotiator in me
The superiority complex in me
The steamed-rice lover in me
The soccer fan in me
The bandh and union-baji in me
The infinite appetite in me

The kal-bosekhi storm in me
The hemanta-manna-kishore in me
The victorian romance in me
The light house back-seat in me
The mystery of red-paar sari in me
The love of Tagore and Ray in me
The village folk-song in me
The bhatiali babu-ghat in me
The rains and wet-saree in me
The beats of saotali drums in me
The ranga-matir-poth in me

You bring out the bengali in me
The blood-red lal-polaash in me
The blue neel – digha in me
The green – moidan’er ghas in me
The yellow – ganda phul mala in me
The chill of darjeeling in me
The thrill of jhik-jhik train in me
The tales of naxal-period in me
The literate ancestors in me
The historical-mistakes in me
The ‘dhoosh shala’ in me
The wannabe intellectual in me

You bring out the bengali in me
The white-shirt school days
The fun and friendship in me
The holidays and sundays
Walking the rain-clogged streets
Feeding home-work to the strays
And grannies never-ending stories
The cautious dad and caring mom in me
The proud grand father in me

You bring out the bengali in me
The surprise of alu-bhaja on hot-rice in me
The shock of mustard on eilish in me
The sensation of green-peas in kachuri in me
The bite of dim-bhaja spread on kichuri in me
The chatni and sweet-sticky-fingers in me
The smoothness of mishti-doi in me

You bring out the bengali in me
The lal-paar shada-saree in me
The rini-jhini bangles in me
The black-kajal around the black-eyes in me
The humming tune in me
The scent of jui-chapa in me
The benarashi saree and sehnai in me
The shyness below the veil in me
The hidden secrets in me
The orgasm of phuchka in me
The raunchy kashundi sting in me
The red sindur in me
The suchitra-uttam matinee love in me

Come to me on a ‘sundor sarnali sondhay’
We will do ‘paye paye poth chola’
Below the ‘neel aakasher nichey’
Talk about ‘purono shei diner kotha’
Sit below the great banyan tree
Dodging the crowd at Esplanade

Lets do the flight of gangchil
With the crescendo of dhak
The smell of rain-soaked-soil
The shal-mohua forest
The black rocks at ghatshila
The shadow of debdaru lined roads
Bring out the bengali in me
The innocent smile of a kid in me
The noon-time orchard thief in me
The lover on full-moon nights in me…

Call me with your sweet ‘ogo suncho’
Serve me the ‘darun eei ranna’
Bring out the bengali in me
Tell me the ‘please kortey nei’
Give me the look ‘shobai ki bhabbey’
Bring out the dushtu-cheley in me
Dont give me just ‘ushno balu’
Just come as ‘ teer bhanga dheu’
Ask me ‘ke prothom kachey esheychi’
And .. at the banks of ‘oh nadi rey’
Hug me in ‘swopno modhur mohey’

You bring out the bengali in me
You bring out the love in me
You bring out the poet in me
Even if ‘duti pakhi duti tirey’
But I sing ‘abar ashbo phirey’
Shei bangali sojoner bhirey…
Evergreen shantir nirey!

– DD