The Aghrana For Going Back

Dipankar Roy

Translation- Sridam Kumar

On coming back yearly, As usual in cycling order, The Aghrana wending to the way of departure Whenever ready on the eve of bidding Farewell I, Just one day or two days previously, get chilled and filled with fear....

Looking forward for the sunshine I startle and become as tensed As a housewife, pouring oil Into the holy lamp With hasty hands yet carefully At the eve of evening....

Birthday Wishes come in torrents Flashing n’ Waving me one after another..

Hardly , now- a-days , There can be seen anyone Standing with a lit up welcome lamp held in hand, even in the daylight , awaiting for Towards my Busy schedule days...

Yet there remain few, those few Who, perhaps , once dreamt of arranging family for me N’ got adorably done it, thereby getting settled, Still there grows passion to start Keeping Me as nucleus with Domestic love flowing n’ glowing around..

How many dear ones are there?

How many to keep themselves moving in their own orbits?

While getting closer and closer to each other, Do we really ever count, at least once,

All the last days concerned ?

This Sankranti day of the Aghrana, being auspicious and special, Still keeps the Boat Baich racing around me ,even today vividly, I too get pricked with the peak of its mast, Thinking of such days gone by...

On its way of memory thereafter,

Is it possible to remember the songs of Itu’s glory ?

Is it possible to remember the faces who were waiting for ?

Is it possible for me to recall How many of them have sent their messages of one -or- two lines Good Wishes for

On my living of this thornly existence ?

CHRISTMAS EVE

Richard Berkeley

On the stable floor

In front of the God-horned man (Joseph, forever by a door, An accidental in the Immortal Plan) Is the mother and child: Even if once, no more A Virgin, yet forever styled “Virgin-Mother-of-God” in holy law.

This is the beginningOf life, death, resurrectionOf innocence, and of sinningOf acceptance at the last, and of rejection.

So, on the Mass of Christ, Feast of Blood and WineSegueing into blood and bread - what is priced Into the bargain - but your soul, and mine?

NEW YEAR’S EVE

Richard Berkeley

On the cusp of the New Year, the Old Year sighs “For everyone born, there’s one that dies”

As the Old Year fades, the New One glows “The young man reaps what the old man sows” Young and old on the cusp of the year, No more to lose; naught yet to fear; Raise your glass to this trick of Time Which has no meaning - unless in rhyme.

The Dance Uncle Jon

You better swallow your pride and do my bidding

Or I will turn you around

You better cancel the truths you’ve been living

Or I will bring you down

I will show you the way that we deal with clowns

We’ll bring you down

We will bring you down down down we’ll bring you down

Yea we’ll bring you down

We will shame you in your office

We will shame you in Gods house

We will shame you when your walking your dog

We will shun you all around

We don’t need no religion

We don’t need no cops

Hanging around

We don’t need no his story

We’re goin to set up this new town

Where anything goes

And everything’s good

Yea it’s all good

All good

I said it’s good

All good yea

You just listen to me and everything’s Cool

We don’t want to have to deal with fools

You see we’ve got this here plan

And we know that we can

Make a quantum shift in the mind of man

Where no one is rich

And no one is poor

And everyone eats

Out of a can

Yea we know that we can

Now the only thing here is that

We must All adhere to this

Old New plan

But if you step out of line

With old ideas don’t rhyme

Then bud you’re out of time

We will cast you out

Like a dog from its home

Till you come back like a dog for a bone

Remember when jobs gone for this view

We’ll comrades now

We play the tune

And you better dance

I said dance

You must dance

And dance the the night away

Dance the night away

I burnt fire

Poetry Papia Ghoshal Translation - Christopher Arkell

I burnt fire

Burnt one dead body on a pyre

Burnt six demons hidden inside that flesh. *

Burnt the wood that burnt it, Burnt the wooden death bed, Burnt the bier

Burnt the shame

Burnt the public blame, Burnt all trace of fear. **

Burnt the beginning; burnt the end, Burnt self, and burnt the graceful hair, O Excellent O wondrous fair. **

The sky touched each of the nine holes

The air touched the breath

Body touched soul; soul touched love

Soul touched the way; the way touched the guru

The guru took the treasure; and the treasure took the soul.

Papia flew from herself, beyond herself on high

Holding the guru’s prow

Here, here am I

Vivid, simple I

Terrific sound, terrific fire

Terrific burst, terrific life

Dauntless; detached.

Dauntless; detached.

Dauntless; detached.

Modern Art Movements Beyond Kolkata

Rajarshi Chattopadhyay Contemporary fine artist & writer

The ‘Shilpi Shibir’ is being organized by an 82 year old association . Devoted to the 138 year old Bally Sadharan Granthagar. The unhurriedly flowing Hooghly river as been joyfully witnessing a unlikely assembly of artists and art lovers for last thirty years in the locality of Bally, Howrah district in west Bengal, India

It was rather a modest beginning by a group of art lover members of the Bally Sadharan Granthagar Karmisangha with their intence creative wish. The first exhibition in 1990 was a blende of photography and drawings by the group members and their friends of same plume . With the support and participation flow in slowly from the inhabitant of Bally, Belur, Uttarpara who had a common dream of founding a platform for practising and showcasing their creations in the locality. After an untimely demise of Soumendra Nath Mukherjee, the main brain behind, in 1992, the exhibition was dedicated to his memory as Soumen Charukala Utsab. The logo of the Ustab was created by well known graphic artist late Bishan Mukherjee, local mentor. Master painters Bijan Choudhury and Prakash Karmakar, founders of Kolkata Painters group, acted as the guardian gods being residents of Bally. The sculptor extraordinaire Debabrata Chakraborty and talented artists of the Contrivance group helped us keeping the creative spirit high in organising the Utsab perpetually since beginning. We received blessings from the esteemed cartoon artist late Rebati Bhushan Ghosh, also a local resident. This year’s Charukala Utsab was dedicated to his memory on his birth centenary.

The first ever healthy sponsorship was extended by the Victoria Memorial Hall authority in 2004 with the valued patronage from Sri Chttaranjan Panda, the then curator. The Shilpi Shibir (annual art camp), as the focal event of the Utsab started expanding with the regular participation by the famous contemporary painters of Kolkata like Robin Mondal, Sanu Lahiri, Ganesh Halui, Gopal Sanyal, Anita Roy Choudhury, B R Panesar, Uma Siddhanta, Partha Pratim Deb, Nikhilesh Das, Hiran Mitra, Jawhar Dasgupta, Anup Roy, Debabrata Chakraborty, Chandi Lahiri, Narayan Debnath, Nripen Nath, Subrata Choudhury, Nirmalendu Mandal, Bikash Mukherjee, and several others. The camp is sincerely inclined towards bringing the young budding painters in closer interaction with the stalwarts and even the art loving spectators in general. Through years of efforts the one day art camp has successfully created a niche for the painters of the district and surrounding suburbs and thus an effective art hub outside Kolkata. Local faces like Animesh Biswas, Pradip Sur, Dipankar Mukherjee, Dr Pradip Choudhury, Udayshankar Hazra, Indrani Bag, to mention a few.

Soumen Charukala

Utsab crossed another threshold when it started receiving grants under CFPGS from the Ministry of Culture, Government of India since 2006. The Utsab started spreading over new horizons by bringing several other events of visual and performing art and culture targeting mainly the children and youth groups of our locality. Events like sit-and-draw, recitation, handwriting, extempore speech, storytelling, essay writing and debates bring in the valued participation of the budding generation and students closer to the library and orient them towards art and culture beyond school education in tune with the library traditions. Since then few days around 25th December every year the riverside ground of the Bally Athletic Club, adjacent to the library, becomes lively and colourful with the cheerful participation of around 1500 to 2000 participants and spectators. For last few years folk artists from rural Bengal and Jharkhnad perform, showcase and sell their traditional arts and crafts like patachitra (scroll painting), wood crafts, chhau masks etc. At the same time, a group of under privileged children are invited in the workshop offering hands on training in paper crafts etc.

Conventionally, the Utsab is launched every year with an exclusive photography exhibition ‘Frame by Frame’ with intermittent workshops on digital editing. Best lot of photographs are selected by the eminent jury members for display and awards are given accordingly. In the process local budding photographers get exposed to works of experts and develop skill. Among the famous photographers Sri Sunil K Dutt, Sri Tarapada

Banerjee, Sri Soumendu

Roy, Sri Sushanta

Bandyopadhyay, Sri Sabyasachi Chakrabarty, Sri Tapas Basu and many more have extended their active support as judges and mentors.

Organising seminars, lectures, felicitations, and staging cultural programmes e.g. drama, music, recitation, etc have also become a part of this venture. ‘Barshiki’ the annual house magazine of Karmisanhga has become a vital organ of this Utsab publishing and documenting every activity. It portrays contemporary literary, artistic, historical, academic, environmental issues and events contributed by respective doyens. Last issue of the magazine was dedicated in memory of late Robin Mondal. Srimatee Sunanda Shikdar, the much awarded writer of ‘Doyamoyeer Kotha’, also a member of the library, is closely associated with the publication as a patron.

We, in Bally Sadharan Grathagar Karmisangha, feel proud in following the path defined by our predecessors to hold our fundamental objectives alive because “We believe that our library is a podium for rendering the service to the nation. We can truly take part in the service if the job is performed with honesty, purity and aptness even being into one’s own sphere .” – reads our plaque of pledge. The completed continuous journey for three decades will take us to newer horizons in spite of unknown hurdles to come but we never paused even during the pandemic though excluded children events.