Επιμέλεια: Εύα Πετροπούλου Λιανού
Tasneem Hossain is a multi-lingual poet from Bangladesh. She is also a fiction and op-ed writer, translator and trainer. Her writings regularly appear in magazines and dailies in the USA, Canada, UK, Singapore and Bangladesh.
Publications: The Pearl Necklace, Floating Feathers and Grass in Green (Poetry) and Split and Splice (article).
She runs a project named Life in lyrics.
She completed her Masters in English Language and Literature and has been a faculty in CUET, Bangladesh. She also worked in Radio Bangladesh for 10years.
She resides both in Bangladesh and Canada.
Is Love a Red Rose?
The fragrance; bleeding red with thorns many times;
Or the overflowing red glow on the lover’s cheeks;
Pain forever in heart, sweet pleasant sensation?
Is Love the vastness of the blue sky?
fountains of tears falling from the clouds,
Or drifting away like an eagle flapping wings
somewhere far in oblivion ?
Is love the musky scent of yellow marigold flowers?
Spreading Butterfly’s wings,
taking honey and fragrance of flowers
making friends with the wind?
Is Love the green grass?
union of the grasshopper and touch me nots,
Laughing and gently touching the shy touch me nots and
Falling asleep in the soft breeze?
Is Love the deep darkness of the night?
Or is it fulfilling promise in the moonlit night
smiling, crying, in the silvery light?
Thoughts of an Immigrant
She stands in front of the canvas and stares.
Recollections of her childhood, memories flash.
Her rendevouz with the flora and fauna of Sundarbans;
her eye contact with the Royal Bengal tiger linger on.
Ah! the breeze and nature’s playful song
singinga lullaby to her innocent mind.
Down the memory lane all comes flooded as in a dream:
the steamboat engine and the rough water tides.
Fifty years of separation from her birth country, she sighs.
Her paintings speak of her love divine
of a country that she left behind.
Visitors stare, praises abound;
tears roll down, she is flooded with the pressmen around.
She smiles and gives a valliant look.
Now in a far off land she resides;
She has not left Bangladesh, her motherland, behind.
Treasured in the heart, locked with a feather key;
floating feathers of her past life, she feels free.
The meaning of her life she has found at last.
Life is full of echoes and contrast.
Connected with the invisible cord
Life plays on different beautiful chords.
Unstoppable
You are unstoppable.
You rush through the clouds and seven seas;
Mountains and forests, you just breeze over and in.
Every little, big thing you can easily win.
The beauty of the lady you can enjoy thoroughly;
The love of the men you gain easily.
The sword of the men, the tanks on the battlefield,
The delicate vase on the table, the soft curtains-
Nothing puts on you, a rein.
Come snow, come storm,
The prison or the chains;
Everything you pass with ease and oh so fast!
Your winged chariot roams around countries so vast.
You are unstoppable my gallant and lovely thoughts.
