I Didn’t Keep My Word

I Didn't Keep My Word

I don't keep my word I don't keep my word;

even to myself I didn't keep my word

so I don't keep my word with anyone.

Between my mother and me

there was only one word we understood,

that I wouldn't give heed to what my eyes and ears told me.

Filling the sky at dawn

with the one single word in the blue expanse

like an immense lotus with its petals opened wide,

Tl fill up my room with one word such as this;

but I didn't keep my word.

The word was: let mine and your and their children's

blue cricket field

and the lines of those flushed faces

go unharmed. When blind headless time

stretches forth its hand like a ghost

we'll instill courage and genuine sun;

but we didn't keep our word.

We'll give the word the office of chief queen,

we'll give it the keys to the kingdom, we'll give it the crown,

we'll give mango blossoms, cuckoos

and the first month of spring,

we'll break the words into bits and make them up again.

In the darkness of the mine of words lies meaning,

a thousand and one meanings - I'll make them leave home

and go outside in the sun;

but I didn't keep my word.

I've given the word swathed in tears and blood

to parents and children,

to the word itself, to dreams and birds;

but I didn't keep those words.

I don't keep my word I don't keep my word;

even to myself I didn't keep my word

so I don't keep my word now with anyone.

Translated from the Bengali by Carolyne Wright

with Syed Manzoorul Islam and the author

Translator's Note

Among contemporary Bengali poets, Ruby Rahman is renowned

for her lyricism, consummate craft, and literary and cultural allusiveness.

Informed by European Modernism and by early twentieth-century

Bengali poets like Rabindranath Tagore and Jibanananda Das, her

work is complex and intellectually engaging. Translating her poetry

was a joy and privilege. We usually met in the office of my collabora-

tor, Syed Manzoorul Islam, chair of Dhaka University's English

Department. We read through each poem word for word, producing

a first version in English that conveyed accurately the sense of the

original Bengali. I copied the literal word order, noting subtleties like

idiomatic phrases, multiple entendres or word play, and level of dic-

tion. Ruby and Manzoor also pointed out cultural information in the

poem's proverbial expressions, allusions to history or mythology, and

references to customs and traditions Bengali readers would be familiar

with. Then, having immersed myself in the life of the original poem,

and working alone with a Bengali-English dictionary, I combined ele-

ments of the literal version with the relevant cultural information,

to create a translation as faithful as possible to the original and also

(Ihope) successful in its own right. I showed this version to Ruby and

Manzoor to correct any remaining inaccuracies.

"I Didn't Keep My Word" was interesting for its use of anaphora -

uncommon for this poet-and its humor with a biting edge, in the

speaker's half-serious, half-tongue-in-cheek critique of every aspect

of her life. The poem's repetition with variation of the title declaration

(kathä rakhi ni in Bengali), grows almost chant-like (or even rant-like,

in a tone of high, Ginsbergian dudgeon) -a play on nuances of the

word "word" (katha) which, as in English, means both verbal

signifier and promise. It's as if, even with her own high standards for

personal conduct, the speaker is frustrated that no one (particularly

the mother figure) finds this good enough, so that she finally has

thrown up her hands and declares that she simply can't and therefore

won't even try. The poem becomes an extended meditation on the

fragility of promises and the fraying of good intentions in the face of

life's demands. - c.w.