CCU to CCU (Coronary Care Unit to Calcutta)

Away from home,
 Away from my dear cat, my books and papers, my friends,
 Away from my life,
 With my face and head covered in a quilt stinking of uncertainty,
 Lying for days on end
 Lying one knows not where,
 With the heart gnawed and clawed viciously.

Then when the heart stops, the inevitable CCU,
 To draw life somehow back from the edge,
 Back to throbbing, the heart would like to return,
 the sick body seeks home,
 To return to the cat, to friends, to the cherished touch.
 The mind journeys from CCU to CCU . . . !

Who cares to listen to the heart!
 Picked up from the CCU, she is told,
 In a voice severely sombre, that shakes you to the core,
 Go to some other country, leave this land.
 Where can I go? I’ve no other place to go,
 When I die, bury me in this soil,
 You can then tear up the soil to find my roots.

Who cares to look into anything?
 Who cares to be miserable at a human being washed away in her own tears screaming for help?
 From the CCU into exile,
 They flung me once again like dirt into darkness,
 They had washed their hands clean, the distinguished authorities,
 I stood before them, with bowed head, and folded hands.

(Dainik Statesman, February 7, 2008)

Translated from the original Bengali by Samik Bandyopadhyay