Life, Dreams and Reality -- Sohel's Blog

Proposed Solution for "Slave Labour" in Bangladesh Garments

2013-05-09T23:06:00.000-06:00

The death toll has reached more than 1000 (last count is 1033 at the time of this writing) and still more decomposed bodies to come. It has already become one of the worst industrial disasters in the world. Unlike unsustainable and more devastating ideas like boycotting garments from Bangladesh, Nobel laureate Dr. Muhammad Yunus proposed seemingly sensible approaches to solve the dire garments labour crisis in Bangladesh. In his article, first published on The Daily Star last night and just now on The Huffington Pos t , this Banker to the Poor rightfully stresses that boycotting Bangladeshi garments would hurt the very poor of this developing nation, causing sufferings to many more millions of Bangladeshi women and men.

However, the international community cannot just stay mute in the face of the soaring body count from the collapsed building at Savar, Bangladesh. Right pressure points are already in action for which the response from the Bangladeshi government looks like to be going to the positive direction as it has started to shut down the unsafe garments factories. Talks of having better labour rights are in traction as well. These are all positive outcomes after more than a thousand people crushed to death under the shattered concrete and steel.

Dr. Yunus' two proposals are the following:

"...foreign buyers will jointly fix a minimum international wage level. For example, if the minimum wage is now 25 cents per hour in Bangladesh, then they will standardize minimum wage for garment industry as 50 cents per hour. No buyer will give any salary below this rate, and no industry owners will fix salary below this limit. It would be an integral part of compliance.
The second proposal is given in an example: "Bangladesh garment factory produces and sells a piece of garment for $5 which is attractively packed and shipped to New York port. This $5 not only includes the production, packaging, shipment, profit and management but also indirectly covers the share that went to the cotton producing farmers, yarn mills for producing the yarn, cost of dying, and weaving as input cost. When an American customer buys this item from a shop for U.S. $35, he feels happy that he got a good bargain. The point to notice is that everyone who was involved in production collectively received U.S. $5. Another U.S. $30 was added within the U.S. for reaching the product to the final consumer. I am asking the question whether a consumer in a shopping mall would feel upset if he is asked to pay U.S. $35.50 instead of U.S. $35 for the item of clothing. My answer is: no, he'll not even notice this little change. If we could create a "Grameen (or BRAC) Garment Workers Welfare Trust" in Bangladesh with that additional 50 cents, then we could resolve most of the problems faced by the workers -- their physical safety, social safety, individual safety, work environment, pensions, healthcare, housing, their children's health, education, childcare, retirement, old age, travel could all be taken care of through this Trust. Bangladesh annually now exports garments worth U.S. $18 billion. If all the garment buyers accept this proposal, then U.S. $1.8 billion would be received by the Trust each year. This would mean that an amount of $500 would be deposited in the Trust for each of the 3.6 million workers. If this amount of fund can be collected, the situation of the workers can be vastly improved. All we have to do is to sell the item of clothing for $35.50 instead of $35. Small unnoticeable addition to the price can do workers."

Yes, there will be challenges to accomplish these two proposals, but I believe it is plausible. Because of 50 cents price hike for a shirt that initially cost $35 (an example), perhaps there will be a few disgruntled discount loving buyers who may shy away from buying that shirt, but as Dr. Yunus proposed that adding a special tag in each shirt stating that it was created by the "happy workers of Bangladesh", may attract more buyers in the end. Consumers are becoming more sophisticated in this blooming light of the information age. If serious efforts are made where a trusted institution looks after the workers' well beings, and Bangladesh government continues to take the necessary actions ensuring the safe and reliable workplace, there is no reason why international buyers would look to other places instead.

Savar disaster is indeed the result of the dysfunctional politics in Bangladesh. Perhaps the citizenry will indeed come to their senses, at last, as Dr. Yunus and many millions near and far plead, and take the united actions to resolve this atrocious dysfunctionality arising from the vengeful and corrupted politics.

Tears in Garments from Bangladesh

2013-04-28T17:59:00.000-06:00

The heartbreaking image above is from The Daily Star. A sister crying over the photo of her brother who is trapped in that collapsed building at the Rana Plaza in Savar, Bangladesh. This is the day five after that collapse, killing hundreds of workers and injuring many. The total number of casualties is still unknown as many more are feared to be trapped underneath the piles of concretes of the collapsed building.

Every day the hopes for finding more survivors are diminishing. Miracles do happen, and some are still getting rescued because of some heroic and tireless rescue efforts. The relatives, standing near, holding their loved one's photos in outstretched hands, looking toward the rubble, a live tomb, where many garments workers died for the sole reason of complete indifference toward workers' basic human rights for a safe work environment. Was it too much to ask for?

Garments workers in Bangladesh get one of the lowest wages in the entire world. This unfortunate fact is also one of the reasons Bangladesh is competitive, and is now one of the largest manufacturers of garments in the world. But the disparity between what the workers get in Bangladesh, and the other nations is striking.

Per a table showing in Wikipedia all the minimum wages by country, the workers' minimum wage in Bangladesh is 11 cents an hour, that is $220 per year. Even a discount store if one visits, like the other day I observed at Walmart that one of the marked down prices of a shirt made in Bangladesh was $10.00. I do not have the data on how long a skilled garments worker take to manufacture a shirt, but the difference between ten dollars and eleven cents seemed to me simply mind blowing. For a discounted shirt of $10.00, for example, if an average worker takes about 3 hours to make a shirt (a generous number of hours it seems), then the worker gets mere 33 cents for her or his 3 hours long efforts. Subtracting 33 cents from ten dollar still leaves $9.70 per discounted shirt. Applying simple statistics in this crude example, a garment worker earns 3% from a $10.00 shirt, and the garments owners and the sellers combined make 97% of the revenue earned.

Of course there are cost involved in any business. Even applying all kinds of business costs, it does not seem 3% earning is fair for an average garments worker in Bangladesh for this hypothetical example where the price of a shirt was $10.00. In many cases, the price of a shirt is way more than $10.00. The price range can be anywhere between $15 to $100 or more. In those cases, for store like GAP, Sears, Bay and many other similar ones, the ratio of a garments worker's earning to the price of a shirt will be much lower than a heavily discounted shirt.

It is true that many millions of impoverished Bangladeshi women and men were and are given new hopes and better livelihood through these jobs in garments sector. About 80% of exports earnings of Bangladesh is from its garments industries that has huge impact on its GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Then a question may arise naturally as to why such a vital industry's workers are not given their basic rights to have a safe work place? Garments workers are getting the lowest comparative wages and from time to time are getting burnt or crushed to death. It is indeed a rotten deal at the best.

In my previous writing on this very subject a few days ago I asked a few questions. Mainly, why would the government of Bangladesh not take the necessary steps to protect its garments and other workers who are the vital source of its economy's longevity? Why is it that the owner of this particular collapsed building Rana Plaza is a member of the ruling party, and only a few days ago, even after the building collapse was boastfully travelling in a car with his hoodlum cadres? Is it possible for a grade 8 failed student amassing such wealth and power without the direct complicity of the ruling party? Where are the real culprits, the large gigantic sharks, who repeatedly use Rana and other muscle-man thugs like cadres to preserve the lucrative power? Not only the ruling Awami League, the opposition BNP too depend on these goons and criminals to survive and thrive in polluted political environment of Bangladesh.

Who will come forward to demand the workers' rights? The glimpse of hopefulness that Shahbag's protest movement had shown in February, seems to be fizzled out in the end by not being more inclusive, and for only demanding punishment for crimes committed in the brutal war of 1971. One laughable quotation I can still remember from that movement was something like this: "when there is geography exam, we will study for geography, when there is math exam, we will study for math", meaning the movement would focus only on one demand, that is the justice of the war criminals. Such a lonesome demand devoid of any practical connections of greater crimes being committed in present days literally in broad day light can hardly be sustainable. Anyone can call himself or herself a progressive, or a movement to be progressive without the slightest bit of notion what progressivism really means. Progressives do not live in an island where only a single injustice can be focused on, as injustice is rarely alone, it has its roots, sprouted branches and leaves, like the giant trees and expanding forests, where one injustice festers another, interlinking many more in seemingly an overwhelming dominating force to reckon with. The collapsed building in Bangladesh, the sheer indifference of the building and the garments owners is only a small puzzle piece in the reckless adventures of riotous life wreckers.

Tearful agony of this sister crying over her buried brother's photo near the collapsed building is heartfelt and her and other like hers pain have touched hearts of many, near and far. Murmurs of discontents on the shabby political system of Bangladesh that most possibly has direct or indirect links for the causes of so many innocent life lost in this tragic collapse can be heard in office corridors or the cafeteria in the western nations. This will create pressure points, and quite possibly the right pressure points, that may fasten the most needed collapse of the rotten political system in Bangladesh, and from this rubble, from the tears and agonies of dead and the livings, perhaps the very needed political reformation steps will at last materialize, truncating the sprouted branches and leaves of corruptions, and preserving the core human rights of the trampled workers.

Tragedies in Bangladesh - a Forewarning

2013-04-25T00:13:00.000-06:00

This tragedy in Bangladesh is incomprehensible to me. Collapsed building. Possibly many hundreds poor workers died. Women, children and men. There was clear warning. Even a bank's branch in the same building told their employees not to go to work in that fateful day. But for the garments workers, the warning didn't matter, the owner of the building looked like colluded with the owners of the garments factories and forced their impoverished employees to come to work in that cracked building, that collapsed and killed and injured many.

Why this type of tragedy gets repeated in Bangladesh? Only a few months ago, another devastating incident happened, when another garments factory burnt down, and more than a hundred of their employees perished, some of their bodies charred to beyond recognition.

Is it only the faults of the garments owners? Does the government of Bangladesh share any responsibility? Why wouldn't there be strict enforcement of already existing regulations on safety and hazards in industrial settings? How do the garments owners keep making the same costly mistakes without fearing any consequences?

Garments in Bangladesh is important for its economic growth. It is true that a large segment of the impoverished population gets lifted out of the dire poverty to a better life and livelihood. The lower cost of the manufactured products that Bangladesh can provide gives it the competitive advantages than its eager competitors in the region and beyond. But this momentary competitive advantages may not remain advantageous for long if the big corporations from the wealthy nations start taking this type of human tragedy and its implicit cost into their ledger equations that surely they should do on the humanitarian ground. This is only a matter of time. There are already political pressures in the West on respective corporations to rethink sending garments orders to Bangladesh. Supply and demand will play its part, but these extraneous pressures will nudge the equilibrium point to somewhere else in the end, that will slow down the economic growth in Bangladesh, affecting millions of poor workers whose livelihood depends on these garments factories.

A truly effective leadership is needed in Bangladesh that is not engaged in an endless squabbles (family feuds?) with its equally quarrelsome oppositions. Ruling and the opposition parties are for the people, but how much do they really do for solving the real problems of vast majority of people? A nation cannot function in any proper way if the governance becomes a hobbled shamble in the midst of the repeated vengeance among the political elites and their hired goons. A sincere truce is an urgent necessity. It's good to see that the economically counterproductive strikes were withdrawn by the opposition parties in the face of this tragic collapse of a building and deaths of people that could have been easily prevented only if the saner decisions were made not to send the workers to that death trap. This whole painful situation wound't be arising if the government of Bangladesh took the proactive actions making sure that the building codes, safety and hazards regulations were enforced in time.

In the hindsight, many things can be said, many conjectures can be made. But the truth of the matter is that this incomprehensible tragedies should be a forewarning for all the decision makers in Bangladesh. Time is indeed running out for preserving the competitive edges. For each heartbreaking agony, dusty face and the ornamented limb of the dead bring shame, as it should, and it can also potentially bring more disastrous consequences for millions many losing their livelihood if garments factories start collapsing in the economic front too.

Coffee Houser Sei Addata – a Nostalgic Song of Manna Dey – Transient Moments

2013-04-23T21:23:00.000-06:00

A very old song from Manna Dey, the legendary Bengali singer, “Coffee Houser Sei Addata Aaj ar Nei” – meaning, “That hangout in the coffee house is no more” – is such a melancholic and nostalgic song that the listeners, the lovers of this timeless song can easily get completely immersed with the vivid images that the lyrics describe, the life of old friends, the successful ones, and the ones whose poems never get published, and the one whom the life has not forgiven, who is dying from cancer, and the editor of a newspaper, and his critiques, the debates of poets and their poetry, the artist who used to draw for an advertising firm, and his silent admirer, these are all lyrically sung by Manna Dey, a singer who is undoubtedly remain in the highest respectable place in listeners’ hearts.

This is a song of life and its transient moments of happiness, fleeting and temporary, seems too short of a life, the forgotten and the faded faces of long lost friends, scattered around, some lost in the depth of oblivion, some lost in the whirlwind of chaos, but that Coffee House still remains intact, where new laughter emerge from the new faces, new gossips, new ages, drinking coffee, as did the singer before in his time with his beloved friends who are all long gone, far away.

Enjoy your drink, and reminisce, and of course cherish every blessings of this life, evanescent and never permanent.

Deja Vu

2013-04-18T18:50:00.002-06:00

[This is my Toastmasters speech that I delivered earlier today, April 18, 2013 at my local club]

Do you have that eerie déjà vu feeling sometime? Like, don’t I know this or that person from somewhere, but in reality you have met for the first time. Or, you went to a beautiful vacation spot where you have never been before, and you look at the crushing blue waves, its bubbly whitish froths and the rising sun peaking from the glowing horizon, and suddenly you remember being in that very spot, standing on the soft sands, but actually this was the first time you have visited this particular sea beach.

I find these déjà vu feeling fascinating. What is the reason of it? Is it some kind of trick that our curious mind plays on us? Is it the manifestation of brain’s synaptic circuitry’s random spike? Or is there a deeper reason behind it? Is it a glimpse of a past life, and possibly this reincarnated life has a flash from that forgotten memory?

I was watching the first season episode from a TV series called Fringe last night. In this particular episode, the FBI agent Olivia Dunham, jumps between two realities, one is her current one, and the other one is the alternative reality. The superbly genius scientist explained that in our life every action that we take it has other possibilities. An action we take, and an alternative action we could have taken creates branches in our universe, that is in some other realities, I am delivering a different speech, or even I might not have this very existence.

I found this notion quite captivating. It made sense to me. Think about the major world religions that talk about human being having the free will. We decide on every moment of our life which path to take, and which to discard without hesitation. Do I partake in the killing of animals and fish, eating their fleshes? Or do I select a different, more peaceful and sensible path? Do I voice my opinions and protest in the face of injustice, or do I act like a hopeless coward with heartless indifference? Do I work ethically and responsibly with compassion, or do I become an unethical and ruthless maniac? The choice is entirely my, but the consequences are deep and felt throughout the ages, cultures and generations.

Could the alternate realities and the déjà vu be someway related? Freudian or the Non-Freudian psychologists may have their never ending debates analyzing the root causes of these perplexing phenomena, but a simple and perhaps naive person like me, it is a good feeling realizing that perhaps other parallel realities exist, just beyond our wakeful consciousness, where different possibilities have a more democratic and just world where poverty is indeed kept in the museum, and war mongers and violence seekers’ depravity can only be read in dusty history books.

If you have that déjà vu feelings sometime, as I do in some random occasions, may be you will see things and the world a bit differently now, pondering what could have been, and what you, I and all of us still could do and achieve in our existence filled with infinite possibilities. What a wonderfully mysterious universe we all are part of!

Long live Déjà vu!

Sleep

2013-04-18T18:46:00.000-06:00

[This is a Toastmasters speech that I delivered last month, March 2013 at my local club]

I woke up this morning feeling groggy. Slight weakness I felt while dragging my sleepy feet doing my morning chores getting prepared to come to work like any other days. Maybe you have gone through one of these sleepy head morning yourself dear Toastmasters when your body would like to go back to bed in the warm comfort of a comforter and snuggled to your loved one, but your alarmed mind would snap back at you for that foolish desire to take the extra nap in the morning of a busy weekday. Wishful thinking, huh!

The main reason that a person can feel sleepy in the morning is not having enough sleep the previous night because of being immersed in a donkey party or staying awake watching late night comedy show in TV. The current scientific research from respected scholars suggests that a healthy human being needs between 7 to 8 hours of sleep per night. A baby sleeps much more than that, and when you reach a certain age like 60s or 70s or more, the number of hours a person can sleep generally decreases, but I understand there can be exceptions to this rule.

What happens when quality sleep is missing from a person’s life? Some of the effects can be quite obvious. For example, you may forget to turn on your right turn signal at a busy road crossing like the driver just before me this morning did, causing me to press hard on brake and stopping the car a few inches away from the suspected sleepy head. Or like about 15 minutes later the same morning, when I proved to be the sleepy bony head too, and almost hit a car by failing to interpret the oncoming car’s truest intention taking a left turn. I felt lucky both time. I or the other driver did not become one of the statistics in accident registers saved somewhere in Police or traffic division.

Almost every morning on my drive to work or returning to home, I see multiple accidents, some of them severe, on Deerfoot Trail, flashing cops car, emergency vehicles surrounding one or two or even more cars that collided, their bonnets shriveled like a mere tin can, glass windows shattered on the road, and frantic and blaring alarm sound of rushing ambulance to help the drivers or the passengers of the damaged vehicles are disturbing imageries. Scary scenes indeed, while these accidents create the very ordinary looking long lines of furious cars on a busy roadway, taking away valuable time from people’s lives spending in traffic jam as if there is nothing better to do.

Car accidents are not the only devastating impacts that lack of sleep can have on human beings. It can negatively affect a person’s concentration span. Yes, caffeine loaded coffee or black tea can surely help temporarily, but the caffeine has its own problem that is better to left for another discussion, but it is suffice to say that any temporary measure to remove the sleepy head has negative health consequences in the long run.

One alarming news came to my attention recently through BBC online that states that having less amount of sleep than the prescribed 7 to 8 hours per night affect human heart as the heart does not get to its resting pace that needs, and in the long run it weakens the hurt muscles and contribute into heart disease and other ailments.

So, what are the steps we can take to assure a restful sleep? A few of them I find useful are:

Do regular cardio vascular exercise, like running, jogging or walking
Don’t exercise at least two hours before sleep
Don’t overeat during dinner
Turning off all digital devices when nap time approaches
Keeping a regular sleeping pattern, like setting a time at night for going to bed

These are my personal findings but these steps can help you too. I know all of these rules by heart, but hey, I am a human being full of frailty and contradictions like most mortals. So, in many nights I forget my own rules, and stay awake for the silliest reason you can imagine, like last night, watching old episodes of Star Trek Enterprise at Netflix, not one, but two full episodes, the battles between 22^nd century’s human space explorers and exotic aliens like Xindi or Kleon from faraway planets, time travelling, Vulcan’s desperate attempts to humor kept my mind occupied well past my set bed time, and even when I went to bed, I could not fall in sleep right away, and did not have a quality sleep I needed. And that was the reason I was groggy early this morning with slightly dizzying head, sleepy eyes, and driving a car in wintry condition among many more like me sleepy heads on a chilly road. Not a good idea, but that’s what life is, full of stupidity that we can easily choose to avoid like a responsible citizenry should do.

Buzz

2013-04-18T18:38:00.002-06:00

[Text from my Toastmasters Speech - Delivered two months ago]

The day before yesterday, I started hearing a buzz noise in my head. Please don’t laugh! This is not a joke. The first time I noticed it, I thought this was an ambient sound in my house. It was late at night. I was about to sleep. I was hearing a slight light pitched humming sound, as if hundreds of bees were swarming and buzzing not too far from me. I switched on my bedside lamp and looked around, really! And there were no bees. I did feel stressed a bit, thinking what was happening to me? What was that noise around or in my head? It took sometime for me to calm down and fall into sleep that night.

When I woke up in another wintry and dark morning, I could still hear the buzzing noise. Before going out to my drive to work through morning rush, I checked the net and searched for the causes of having this condition and found that there are many possibilities. Some of these possibilities are very scary, like brain tumor, neurological disorder, etc., to mild ones, like wax build up in ears or ear infections. Oh my God! That was what exactly I said to myself. There I was, in my prime, planning for all kinds of career moves ahead of time, devising software development and stocks investing strategies using various underlying technologies, wanting to relearn piano and keyboard, yearning to visit the beautiful Kawai, the second Hawaii island I could not visit in last year’s Mawii vacation, and planning for extending my family.

Somewhere I heard once that man dreams and God laughs. All my meticulous planning, scheduling, budgeting, devising looked meaningless at that point in the morning as I was driving through the regular heavy traffic in Deerfoot Trail South. All the political and the entertainment news flashing through my iPhone apps seemed like pointless. I thought, this is it then. I never thought I was immortal, but never accepted that the end can be so early and so horridly possible.

Dear Toastmasters. You may think that I am overreacting. I say, yes I am. I am overreacting to the remotest possibility of dying. I am overreacting to an unpleasant outcome, and unknown afterwards. Will there be a heaven or a hell? Will there be a benevolent and all loving God, waiting for me after the spiraling and the lightened tunnel or will there be an incomprehensible non existence? What will happen to my loved ones? Will the insurance and banks give hard time to them after I am gone? How would my loving family feel? These and many other questions ran through my mind in that otherwise monotonous drive to work that morning.

I made an appointment to see my very busy doctor in later part of today, and hope to know what is the cause of this buzzing sound. Maybe, it will be nothing serious. Or, perhaps it will be something drastic and heartbreaking. I don’t know yet. But this is what I know, these invisible bees, the buzzing have changed something in me that is making me look at my known world in a different light already. It has raised the questions of what is important in life, and what is not. It has started making these precious moments that I take for so granted, as real precious, and not so infinite.

[Note: Later it was found that the stubborn wax in ears was acting as the sound of "bees".]

We Are One Species

2013-04-07T15:31:00.001-06:00

Iain Banks’s writing is not familiar to me. A few days ago, from a BBC news article I came to know about his terminal cancer. So sad that news was! Only 59 years old. The Times mentioned him in their 2008 list “The 50 greatest British writers since 1945”. Per Wiki he wrote 26 novels and is apparently to publish his last novel this year.

I have read a second article today in The Guardian, and the writer is Iain Banks. This article was extracted from an earlier essay the writer wrote as “Our People” in 2010 in a book titled “Generation Palestine: Voices from the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement”.

I find that it is not easy to write anything about the mess both Palestinians and Israelis are in for many decades. I’d written some articles before, denouncing both the bloody terrorism and disproportionate responses and meaningless provocations from both sides. These days I am hesitant to write anything more on this painful subject, as so many essays, books and fine analysis written about this problem, by so many brilliant and thoughtful writers around the world, including humanists from Israel and Palestine, one more writing seems to me would not change the wrecking course of this runaway disaster.

This morning, Iain Banks’ writing in The Guardian has helped me changing my mind. Why would I not write? Is it only for not adding another article in the vast expanse of expanding Internet that perhaps not many people read anyways? Or is it for outright fear? The fear of getting maligned or worse, for expressing thoughts in support of millions of vulnerable people in a faraway land? Iain Banks did not fear to write for what he believed to be the truth. Nor did countless many during and after the Second World War, describing inhumanity of The Holocaust, the agonies, buried tears of millions of tortured and gassed human beings only because of their ethnicity or religion.

Some say and wag their naysaying fingers for not to meddle with the painful subjects of history. But, I say, how do human beings can progress to greater, matured and peaceful enlightenment unless taking the lessons from history, refreshing the forgetting memories, so that the similar genocides will not repeat? The answer I believe is self-evident. Human beings’ progression to a greater civilization where wars, violence and naked or subtle hatred will only be described in books of history or museums is possible, but not without our collective and individual struggles.

Here is an extract from Iain Banks’ article that summarizes everything that need to be known about injustice:

“The solution to the dispossession and persecution of one people can never be to dispossess and persecute another. When we do this, or participate in this, or even just allow this to happen without criticism or resistance, we only help ensure further injustice, oppression, intolerance, cruelty and violence in the future.

We may see ourselves as many tribes, but we are one species, and in failing to speak out against injustices inflicted on some of our number and doing what we can to combat those without piling further wrongs on earlier ones, we are effectively collectively punishing ourselves.”

Voluminous texts are written in the field of human psychology or social anthropology, however, why injustices are still rampant in this supposedly more progressive 21^st century? It is still shameful, oh yes, I am also involved in this shameful cowardice and uncaring attitude, and indeed it is utterly appalling for us the so called master of our “free wills”, taking our eyes and ears away from the tears, screamed agonies of our fellow beings.

If you read Iain Bank’s words carefully, you will see his loud emphasis on the following: “we are one species, and in failing to speak out against injustices inflicted on some of our number and doing what we can to combat those without piling further wrongs on earlier ones, we are effectively collectively punishing ourselves.”

We are punishing ourselves, and condemning our future generations to do the same, and contributing in the degradation of human progression back toward shadowy ages I believe no modern human beings would like to turn back to.

Palestinians’ and Israelis’ painful saga is one mere example. In addition to other wrongful wrecks that are ongoing, like in brutal civil war in Syria, never ending violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, theocratic Iran, puzzling North Korea and its starving population where a despot ruler threatens the world with nuclear toys, Pakistan’s dubious killings, the heartless drones, extra judicial killings of innocent children, women and men, not only in the troubled regions we all know about, but also in relatively stable places like Bangladesh, Burma, India, Philippines, etc., do not bode well toward a peaceful world.

One example I will elaborate is Bangladesh where the entire nation seems to be slowly moving toward more violence, pitting opposing factions against each other by possibly clever political ploys. Iain Banks’ warning can easily be applied to Bangladesh. The recent arrests of bloggers is a troubling sign. Why would a democratic government arrest anyone for simply expressing their opinions? Should a democratic nation discard its sacred promise to protect humanity and preserve equality for all to please the fanatical demands of any factions? What the heck a blasphemy law means anyway? One man’s religious belief or lack of belief may not align with another, but does that mean he or she needs to be subjugated by the thumb down majority rule?

The problem in Bangladesh is that both the ruling and the opposition parties have lost people’s trust in them because of their past utter dishonesty, corruption and for using violence and deception to achieve political goals. This has created a dangerous vacuum, where the two diametrically opposing elements, the religionists supported by the reactionary parties like Jamaat and BNP, and the so called progressive and the liberal left initially pampered by the ruling party Awami League are at each other’s throat, like two ferocious warriors fighting over their precious claim on the mismanaged nation. Without solving the core of the problem that the writer Iain Banks so eloquently written for injustices occurring in another place this will remain unresolved. Only by stopping our collective punishment, by not piling one wrong over another in the name of camouflaged revenge and counter revenge, this odorous nastiness in Bangladesh can be solved and people’s trust on their elected government and opposition can be re-established.

Jim Holt, the writer of “Why Does the World Exist”, presented some inquisitive questions in his pleasantly readable book. What stuck to my mind reading it, is that the feeling that possibly other human beings and maybe other species grasp from time to time, and it is that eureka moment, when one understands how lucky one is to be alive at all, in this probabilistically random world, in a solar system residing in a lonely corner of a vast galaxy containing 200 to 400 billion stars, that is itself part of an expanding universe with possibly more than 100 billion galaxies of various sizes, and perhaps, this incomprehensibly gigantic universe is part of a more intricate complex systems of multi verses, for which the origin and the end is still widely debated.

Our existence in this world, how miniscule it may seem in the overall scheme of the universe and beyond, does not have to be meaningless. We are one species, human or non-human, in this timeline, inherited the past history of triumphs and failures from our buried predecessors. The finiteness of our brief existence in this universal randomness or perhaps pre-ordained fate, is linked with each one of us. The same is true for our actions, inactions, caring and uncaring in front of struggles to achieving fairness for all.

Here is a poem of Allen Ginsberg “Gone Gone Gone” who understood life and its meaning like Iain Banks:

“Gone Gone Gone”

“The wan moon is sinking under the white wave and time is sinking with me, O!”

–Robert Burns

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone gone away

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone gone away

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone gone away

yes it’s gone gone gone

it’s all gone away

gone gone gone

won’t be back today

gone gone gone

just like yesterday

gone gone gone

isn’t any more

gone to the other shore

gone gone gone

it wasn’t here to stay

yes it’s gone gone gone

all gone out to play

yes it’s gone gone gone

until another day

no one here to pray

gone gone gone

yak your life away

no promise to betray

gone gone gone

somebody else will pay

the national debt no way

gone gone gone

your furniture layaway

plan gone astray

gone gone gone

made hay

gone gone gone

Sunk in Baiae’s Bay

yes it’s gone gone gone

wallet and all you say

gone gone gone

so you can waive your pay

yes it’s gone gone gone

tomorrow’s another day

gone last Saturday

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone gone gone

turned old and gray

yes it’s gone gone gone

bald & old & gay

gone gone gone

whitebeard & cold

yes it’s gone gone gone

cashmere scarf & gold

yes it’s gone gone gone

warp & woof & wold

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone far far away

to the home of the brave

down into the grave

yes it’s gone gone gone

moon beneath the wave

yes it’s gone gone gone

so I end this song

yes this song is gone

gone to kick the gong

yes it’s gone gone gone

No more right & wrong

yes it’s gone gone gone

gone gone away

Faith of the Heart

2013-02-17T16:25:00.002-07:00

Originally performed by Rod Stewart and written by Diane Warren for a great film Patch Adams, I came to listen to this song again in Star Trek: Enterprise episodes performed by Russell Watson, and found it to have a catchy tune and memorable lyrics.

Shahbag Protests - Observations

2013-02-10T14:10:00.001-07:00

The photos from Shahbag are stunning. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered in this square, as if waves of people in a tumult ocean, singing, protesting, united in one common cause, asking for the capital punishment for all war criminals. The passion of people, many of them born many years after the 1971 war, their yearning for justice that were long been snubbed in these past 4 decades after the liberation war in Bangladesh, look refreshing, and feel rejuvenating.

The demand for fairness and a democratic system free from any religion and violence based politics are long standing. The history of Jamaat and its past and current alliances are well documented, though perhaps can be fading in memory.

There are precedence in history when the war criminals are put into trial many years after the war ended. Many Nazi members after the Second World War’s inhumane brutality are the prime examples. The majority of Bangladeshi’s demand is to see justice been done on these criminals whose crime in 1971 of murders, genocides, rapes went unpunished, and sometimes seemed rewarded by being promoted to various high level government posts in successive military and civilian governments after the liberation war.

I am all for justice and fairness. I believe that anyone committed crimes against humanity, who that may be, should put on trial and be accountable for. This absolutely includes the accused Jamaati and BNP leaders, but also the unmentionable ones, who are not affiliated with Jamaat or BNP, but residing in alliance with the ruling party Awami League or perhaps with other unnamed entities. Also, we need to ask one question: what does war crime really mean? Wikipedia has good definition of it and here is the link: War Crime.

Here is a relevant extract of examples of war crime: “murder, the ill-treatment or deportation of civilian residents of an occupied territory to slave labor camps, the murder or ill-treatment of prisoner of war, the killing of prisoners, the wanton destruction of cities, towns and villages, and any devastation not justified by military, or civilian necessity”.

After the past BNP government’s slowing down of the war crime tribunal process, Awami League restarted the process from 2010 after coming to power in 2009, and this is a welcome sign for many. At last, the suppressed cries and agonies of millions of victims from 1971 war are getting heard. Though four decades have passed, the indelible memories of pain and sufferings from 1971 in collective consciousness of many Bangladeshis have overwhelmingly embraced this trial.

This trial also received positive receptions from international community, including US, UK, European Union, and many others. However, concerns raised regarding the transparency and fairness of the tribunal process that must be addressed in order to ensure that the accused, however brutal their alleged crimes maybe, do get treated impartially in the court of law. Court should not be interfered or pressured by the Awami League government to get a quick verdict without going through an exhaustive and transparent legal process.

One may contend that these war criminals should not be shown any leniency, and also the roars from Shahbag Square demand the hanging of the criminals in expediting time frame. These all are full of emotions, how noble it can be seen in the light of victims’ haunted memories, but a cautious and level headed actions are needed, that are not governed by blind hatred toward opposing views or usurpation of party affiliations.

Like the Jamaat and their cohorts’ war crimes, there were also war crimes committed by victorious freedom fighters, hooligans and party affiliates. The extra judicial killings of Biharis and the so called “collaborators” in broad daylight without going through any fair judicial process are also fall into the same category of crimes against humanity. The law is blind, and there are good reasons that it should be. The law should not prefer or subdue one crime over another. Like the alleged war criminal Abul Kalam Azad, Abdul Quader Mollah, Saka Choudhuri, etc., shouldn’t the similar criminal charges be laid against Kader Siddique, hailed as the Hero of Bengal for his fearless contributions in 1971 war as a freedom fighter? No doubt he was indeed a respected freedom fighter, but for his direct involvement in the massacres of prisoners of war in 1971, shouldn’t he and possible others like him be tried in the same war crime tribunal court?

In a free, fair, transparent and impartial court of law indeed all war criminals would be tried without any prejudices.

I can see the colorful flag, young and old’s hands pointed up in unison, and I can hear the beating of tabla, singing, and chanted slogans: “Tui Rajakar…You are Rajakar”….over and over again, and the demand for the war criminals’ capital punishment, whereas in all the modern and advanced nations of our world with surprised possible exception in the United States, capital punishment is banned for good reasons, as it is considered the “ultimate denial of human rights”. Why is it necessary to kill any human being for their past crimes? Doesn’t it stoop into the eye for an eye type of medieval vengeance? To me, and many others, a life time jail sentence for a criminal should be the ultimate price to be paid, whereas, capital punishment, cruelest as it is, also can be quick for the criminals, but a lifetime prison sentence can serve the right justice, as it will deny the criminals the outside coveted world in all their incarcerated lives.

It is not through the polarized division that peace can be brought (unless going through another bloody and unpredictable civil war), and not through the repeated tormenting slogans the deeply reopened wounds can be healed. The refreshing and rejuvenating Shahbag can be a starting point for the redirection of Bangladesh toward a just and more democratic nation, but with caution, and not by devaluing itself being the mouthpiece of the same old and corrupted political elites, whose goals have always been diversion and division.

Wake up Shahbag! Seize the moment! Demand for a free and fair justice of all war criminals, barring none.

Khaleda Zia's Article in The Washington Times - Observation

2013-01-31T23:20:00.000-07:00

The contents in Khaleda Zia's article in The Wasington Times have some merits. Who would in right mind want a democracy to be turned into a kleptocracy, where erosion of people's democratic rights in favor of a family dynasty and supporting cohorts based system that can bring only more miseries for vast majority of Bangladeshis?

Historically speaking, Bangladesh Awami League is widely considered as the left leaning progressive political party, whereas Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), is considered as slightly right leaning centrist party. Their respective founding leaders, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, first Prime Minister of Bangladesh after the brutal 1971 war who is revered in the nation by many as its founding father, and Ziaur Rahman, once a popular president of Bangladesh, was respected by many as a freedom fighter. Both of their violent deaths in the hands of disgruntled military men, in 1975 for Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and in 1981 for Ziaur Rahman, are still remembered as two of the most dark and tragic episodes in the history of Bangladesh. Even there are skeptics who point toward a darker conspiracy in the deaths of these two men within a short decade after the independence.

The current Prime Minister of Bangladesh is Sheikh Hasina Wazed, who is the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. And the current opposition leader and former Prime Minister of Bangladesh is Khaleda Zia who has written this article in The Washington Times, is the widow of late President Ziaur Rahman. For Bangladeshis, these are well known facts, but many in other parts of the world may not have the slightest clue of the complexity in elitist political strata in Bangladesh.

After the 1971 war, in the last 42 years, Bangladesh has many governments, including the elected ones, and the small and long dictatorship by military strongmen. From my childhood, I still have distinct memories, seeing processions after processions of many thousands of people in the crowded streets of Dhaka, demanding real democracy, urging for justice and fairness in the political and wider society. Many had lost their lives or limbs, imprisoned, tortured, and at last forgotten.

Most of the Bangladeshi elections, except a possible few exceptions in recent times, especially after the collapse of last military dictatorship of Hussain Muhammad Ershad, are marred with widespread fraud and predetermined results. That was the reason that both Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia were united together when they were struggling against the military ruler of 1980s. They both supported the idea of an independent caretaker government that can neutrally oversee the electoral process so that the people of Bangladesh can peacefully cast their votes and their votes do get counted. Backing away from this system would be a political blunder.

Some may counter argue that in US, Great Britain, India and many other nations, this type of independent caretaker government does not exist. True. But we need to understand that all these nations have a longer and stabler history of democracy than in Bangladesh. This is not the right time to abandon the independent caretaker government system.

No nation in the world is devoid of corruptions. This is a fact of human life, and perhaps is part of human frailty. Bangladesh is no exception. The recent alarming news of corruptions, like Padma Bridge construction related briberies, giant company like SNC Lavalin's involvements, World Bank's denial of loan to Bangladesh, etc. are not unique in history. Like the corruptions in current Awami League government run by Sheikh Hasina, the previous government run by Khaleda Zia of Bangladesh Nationalist Party were full of deceitful corruptions as well. None of them were flowery saints and each of them have scary skeletons to hide in the closets!

Literate population in Bangladesh is vast. There are many intelligent people who can run this nation wisely and better if given chance through a free and fair election. Being a part of a decorated family is no excuse to bar anyone from the political process as that would be violation of their human rights, however, getting fatter, literally and metaphorically, both the politicians and their joyful relatives while remaining in the power's pulpits, may only prevent Bangladesh and millions of Bangladeshis achieving their full potentials through their democratic rights.

2013 - a New Year

2013-01-04T02:12:00.000-07:00

1.

2013. A new year. A new me! I have made my resolutions too. On New Year’s Eve when the giant apple about to fall, I silently made the mental note what I would like to accomplish in the coming year. The cheers, fireworks, music with wintry gusto make every new year’s eve feels special, though know it well that in cosmic timeline, our skimpy existence and boisterous celebrations may not surmount to anything, but for the mortals billions, these moments spur the longing of a commonality where our aspirations, existential anxiety, love for the beloveds and the daily humdrum of our lives fuse into collective roars that can be heard across the globe, through cyber net, cable media or the simple presence in a stampede free firework show.

The bygone 2012 was memorable. It was the year when dictators fell from their long held power, democracy returned to nations where it was absent for many years, global economy seemed to be turning back from the plunge of dismal recession (though a struggling path is ahead), and technology made more bold advances occupying further aspects of human lives. It was the year the pragmatic progressive Obama won the election over confusing Romney, and it seemed terrorism’s ceaseless bloodshed is cornered like a despotic king isolated in a strategic chess game. These are all the good points to remember from 2012. These are the uplifting stories and events that shaped many of our consciousness and thoughts, opened the horizon’s visibility a bit more, lilting our conscience pleasantly buoying toward the new possibility.

Then there are bitter memories. The repeated wars between Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza and Israel where hundreds of innocent children, women and men died for incomprehensible rationales, the brutality in Syria where more than 60,000 dead in a prolonged war between a ruthless dictator and his democratic but vengeful oppositions, the senseless murders of children in Sandy Hook Elementary School just 11 days before Christmas, Aurora shooting in the summer where mere movie spectators were gunned down during a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises, a 23 year old unnamed Indian woman was brutally gang raped in a bus in Delhi, beaten and thrown out of the moving bus, her fight to survive ended tragically over heartfelt candle light vigils and prayers from around the world, the burnt bodies of 117 poor garments workers in Bangladesh, and 315 garment workers in Pakistan, a business man named Bishwajit Das hacked to death in broad daylight on the street of Dhaka while his gruesome murder was captured by sidelined media, these are the few samples of decadence that perhaps illuminate the world’s collective failures in the realm of humanity.

2.

2012 was the year we lost some great human beings like any other years. A few of them listed below; whose works I was familiar with through their lives’ contributions:

· Ravi Shankar (musician and composer)

o A tribute with links to music videos

· Mehdi Hassan (singer)

o A music video of Mehdi Hassan singing Zindagi Mein Tu Sabhi

o Rafta Rafta – a nostalgic song performed by Mehdi Hassan

o Duniya Kisi Kay Pyar Mein Janat

o Mehdi Hassan performing at London Albert Hall

o Mehdi Hassan performing live at London, 1990

o Mehdi Hassan Live in India

o Mehdi Hassan singing a Bangla song “Tumi Je Amar Bhalobasha” written by my father Bangladeshi lyricist Masud Karim and the music was composed by Pakistani music director Hamid. Another link with better sound quality: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj1S2mBnt3A

· Sunil Gangopadhyay/Ganguly (writer/poet)

o A poem by Sunil Ganguly “Keu Kotha Rakheni” recited by Shimul Mustafa

o “Mon Bhalo nei” – a Bangla poem recitation by Sunil Ganguly

o “Jodi Nirbasan Dao” – the poet reciting his poem in 2009

o “Pahar Churai” – Shimul Mustafa reciting Sunil Ganguly’s poem

o “Ami Ki Rokom Bhabe” – Shimul Mustapha reciting Sunil Ganguly’s poem

o “Kobir Mrityu” – Shimul Mustapha reciting Sunil Ganguly’s poem

o “Jodi Nirbashon Dao” – Recited by Shubir Lawrence

· Humayun Ahmed (writer)

o A tribute

o “Anondo Bedonar Kabboy” – a recitation by Humayun Ahmed

o Humayun Ahmed’s Exclusive Video

· George McGovern (US Senator, World War 2 veteran, civil rights champion, anti-war proponent)

o A tribute

o George McGovern Acceptance Speech at the 1972 Democratic Convention

o McGovern’s Concession Speech

o OETA Newsmaker Interview with George McGovern (2009)

· Arlen Specter (US Senator)

o Congressman Brady’s Tribute to Senator Arlen Specter

o President Obama Pays Tribute to ‘Fighter’ Arlen Specter

· Michael Clarke Duncan (progressed from being a ditch-digger to becoming a famous actor and later in life became an activist for vegans/vegetarians)

o Michael Clarke Duncan Tribute Video

o Michael Clarke Duncan’s Exclusive Interview with PETA

· Neil Armstrong (first man who walked on the moon)

o First Moon Landing 1969

o Neil Armstrong Interview, BBC 1970

o NASA: Neil Armstrong Remarks from Congressional Gold Medal, July 21, 2009

· Gore Vidal (a fearless writer)

o A tribute

o One on One – Gore Vidal

o BBC Hardtalk – Gore Vidal

o William Buckley Vs Gore Vidal

o Vidal vs Buckley: Battle Begins

o Gore Vidal – ‘South Bank Show’ (2008)

· Sherman Hemsley (“The Jeffersons” actor)

o The Jeffersons – George’s Dream

o Math – Bunker Style

· Dr. Stephen R. Covey (motivational speaker and writers of “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People)

o The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

o Convocation 2008 – Steven Covey Speaks at MSU

o Stephen Covey explaining what is a paradigm and a paradigm shift

o 8^th Habit

· Norman Schwarzkopf (Stormin’ Norm)

o World Remembers “Stormin Norm’s Military Legacy

· Larry Hagman (known as J.R. Ewing in TV show “Dallas”)

o Remembering Larry Hagman - CNN

· Andy Griffith (television icon)

o The Andy Griffith Show – Barney and The Cave Rescue

· Ray Bradbury (science fiction writer)

o A Conversation with Ray Bradbury

· Eugene Polley (inventor of wireless TV remote control)

o Eugene Polley-Inventor-TV remote control

· Robin Gibb (Bee Gees singer)

o Bee Gees – Stayin’ Alive

· Donna Summer (singer)

o Hot Stuff

o Last Dance

o I Feel Love

o She Works Hard for The Money

· Chuck Brown (singer)

o Chuck Brown Performs ‘Wind Me Up!’

o The Party Roll

o Bustin Loose

o People Make the World Go Round

o It Don’t Mean a Thing

· Carlos Fuentes (writer)

o Carlos Fuentes on Mexico’s Drug War

o Carlos Fuentes on his book Destiny and Desire and the future of Mexico

· Vidal Sassoon (hairstylist)

o Five Minutes with Vidal Sassoon

o TEDxOxford – Vidal Sassoon – Ted Talk

· Dick Clark (TV host)

o Dick Clark: Farewell to a TV Legend

· Mike Wallace (“60 Minutes”)

o A Look Back at Mike Wallace’s Tough Interviews

· F. Sherwood Rowland (discovered the linkage between by-product of aerosol sprays, deodorants and other consumer products that have negative impact on earth’s atmosphere)

o F. Sherwood Rowland on Origin and Uses of Chlorofluorocarbons or CFCs

· Whitney Houston (singer)

o I Wanna Dance with Somebody

o I will Always Love You

o I Have Nothing

o It’s Not Right But It’s Okay

o I Believe In You and Me

· Etta James (singer)

o Seven Day Fool

o I’d Rather Go Blind

o At Last

o Let’s Roll

o Life, Love & The Blues

o Got My Mojo Working

o The Sky is Crying

o Try a Little Tenderness

o Tell Mama

o Something’s Got a Hold of Me

o Etta James & Chuck Berry – Rock n’ Roll Music

· Dr. William House (promoter of implantable ear device)

· Dr. Joseph Murray (successfully performed first kidney transplant)

· Andy Williams (singer)

o Moon River

o Merry Christmas – O Holy Night

o Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

· Nora Ephron (author and screenwriter)

o Nora Ephron – Conversations at KCTS 9

o Nora Ephron on her mother and journalism

· William S. Knowles (Nobel Prize-winning chemist, helped developing drug for treating Parkinson’s disease among other of his scientific accomplishments)

o Obituary in The Washington Post

· Elizabeth Catlett (artist)

o My Childhood

o Sculpting the Truth

· Adrienne Rich (poet and essayist)

o A tribute

o What Kind of Times Are These – a poem recitation by Adrienne Rich

o The Life of the Legendary Poet & Activist – Democracy Now

o Hearing – a poem recitation by Adrienne Rich

· William Hamilton (theologian)

o Obituary in Los Angeles Times

· Marie Colvin (fearless war correspondent)

o Obituary in The Guardian

· Anthony Shadid (journalist)

o Award winning work at The Washington Post

o Anthony Shadid Remembered – PBS News Hour

· Wislawa Szymborska (poet)

o Biography at Nobelprize.org

o “A Few Words on the Soul” – a translated poem

o “Nothing Twice” – a poem with background music

o “Tortures” – poem recited by Karin

o ”Metaphysics”

o “Statistics” – poem recited by Martha Briggs

o “Hatred” – Videography by Shadi/Greg

o Some of her poems can be found here: http://info-poland.buffalo.edu/web/arts_culture/literature/poetry/szymborska/poems/link.shtml

· Lakshmi Sehgal (freedom fighter and social activist)

o Who is Lakshmi Sehgal?

o Obituary - The Telegraph

· Rajesh Khanna (actor)

o Ye Shaam Mastani – a song from Rajesh Khanna’s acted movie “Kati Patang”.

o Zindagi Ek Safar

o Haathi Mere Saathi

o Mere Sapno Ki Rani

o Achcha To Hum Chalte Hain

o Chanda Hai Tu

· Yash Chopra Humayun Faridi (actor)

o Conversation with Yash Chopra

· Humayun Faridi (actor)

o A remembrance

Links to other notable deaths in 2012:

o http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-2012notables-gallery,0,1269713.photogallery

o http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/celebrity/sns-2012-deaths-pictures,0,1525006.photogallery

o http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/notable-deaths-of-2012/2012/01/12/gIQAiKoWUU_gallery.html

3.

Everything seemed slowed down in last ten days of December. Winter started officially. Where I live, snow had covered every inch of the earth, and temperature dived below -20 degree centigrade. It was the time to reflect on life, and perhaps mortality too.

As I have read the passing away of many great men and women of our time belonging to different nations and professions, one commonality that was found in everyone was their continuous struggles and belief in human endeavours, their ceaseless contributions throughout their life in this progressive journey of humanity. Through their writing, singing, acting, scientific discovery or inventions, theological/philosophical/metaphysical/political curiosities and fearless journalism, pursuance toward artistic truth or fighting for justice, equality or a sustainable environment, there seemed to be one universal constant nudging these great men and women, and that was their undying love for humanity, though how lost sometimes it felt in the face of flashing violence and painful apathy.

The ridiculous premonition of Mayan collapsible globe is already literally hanged in the past, and the vilified number “13” is upon us as a mere numeric of this year 2013. Who knows, maybe the over clichéd “unlucky 13” may prove to be the luckiest year for human beings and other species of our world when dictators, bigotry, devious greed, violence and endless wars will be sidelined by humanity’s common yearning toward love and peace. We cannot change a bone chilling winter into a summery breeze outside instantly in this decade of 21^st century, but there is no barring from dreaming. Is there?

The Army of Salvation - a Poem

2012-12-20T18:31:00.000-07:00

Last week my colleagues and I had visited the local Salvation Army as volunteers. The poem below is written for that occasion. If you would like to donate, check the following site: http://www.salvationarmy.ca/tag/donations/

The Army of Salvation - a Poem

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

December 20, 2012

We, the BA and the QA team of heart

And mind with analysis and quality

Took proudly part in helping the army

Of salvation in a day of winter chill

We gathered in a soulful group of zeal

And picked the toys, sorted in carts

Checked out, hoping the bliss and joys

Will find the hands of girls and boys

Bringing the cheery season’s blessings

Into the hearts of many in grim distress

These are the days of giving

These are the days of sharing

Twining our meager existence

With the ones fallen from the fortune

A staffy, a set of miniature cars, crayon

And coloring books, nifty festoon

Can surely erase tears, bringing smile

In mom, dad, children, melting the fortress

Of misery, where love marches in style

Donkeys – a Poem

2012-12-19T22:49:00.001-07:00

Donkeys – a Poem

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

December 19, 2012

Their friends are made of

Lego, one tiny block snuggled

With other block of clay

Manufactured in the land of disappeared dream

These can be twisted one way

Or the other, transforming into cuddled

Shape like embracing king

Their friends are king of

Shadow, blown creepy rock huddled

With other shock of ray

Often tinkered in the grandiose denatured stream

These can be busted one way

Or the other, transposing into muddled

Ape and brandishing bling

ii.

Bow your head, salute and walk

Like an apocalyptic zombie with blood

Smeared lips trembling unuttered words

Of crusted poem from the days of rising

Sun and beaming moon

Here the zombies with guns and

Knives with disheveled hair and foamy eyes

Twaddle in darkness of spinning light

Bow your head, salute and walk

Like a ballyhoo mystic lofty with mud

Cleared lips mumbling the censored shards

Of basted poem from the nights of beaming

Moon and hiding sun

Here the donkeys with yearns and

Hides with distressed ears and puckish eyes

Babble in lightness of grinning blight

Struggle - a Poem

2012-12-13T19:40:00.001-07:00

Struggle

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

December 13, 2012

A night bellows the gale and shivers bone

From moonlight comes the flood of hail alone

Streets and river have merged like brothers sing

Where ocean roars behind the trees’ hovering

That time waves crashed huts and palace in strokes

There went a boy alone clutching straw boats

He looked and saw a man with smile in eyes

That boy begged and screamed with the waning cries

The man of smile just took his eyes away

The drowning boy struggled in watery clay

Note: I have tried to write this poem using iambic pentameter. You can find more info on this type of metering in following location: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iambic_pentameter

I did not find it easy, but the process of writing and thinking in measured lines in stressed and unstressed beat is refreshing. Maybe the next one will be better.

12/12/12 - a Poem

2012-12-12T17:03:00.001-07:00

12/12/12

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

Nothing happened today, this day of

Chilly foreboding with snow and wind,

The world is spinning

On its axis as it did yesterday

Or the day before, to the day of primordial

Soup where organics electrically charged

Perhaps started the dancing of life

In a chaos of inorganic and cosmic silence

Was the creator unseen even then

As He is now, an absentee observant

Of immature organics’ killing spree?

The pope started tweeting today, sending blessings

To devotees of electronic leaning

And the Rabbi, Imam, Priests and the orange robed Monks

Gave their sacred sermons

As they did thousands of years

Repeating the words of wisdom from prophets, divinity, and

The learned of the yester years

Those words in verses glorifying the creator

And His divine prowess, shaking the unbelievers

With raging premonitions

Saying, believe in Him or burn in hell

As if our indifference to sufferings of others

And gloating at the so called “enemies” vanquished,

Decimated with hyperbolic dehumanized zeal

Are not the hell, but heavenly in the eyes of sacrosanct organics

12/12/12 – a day like any other day

A bone shivering cold in the northern hemisphere

When the southern part simmering with summer heat

And the tropics brooding temperance

What have we expected? A booming voice

Rupturing the wall of sky, and the ray of light

Unseen before, striking us, curing us from all thoughts

Of ill, weakness of human heart, greed, lust and thrilling kill?

As the dusky twilight of another ordinary day

Receding into unrecorded history

Silently shattering the myths of feel good numerals

I look through the curtained window to the darkening sky

The night is approaching, and a day of tomorrow

And a new year on the corner with vilified thirteen

Another ordinary day and a year

With the same anxiety, existential and feel good story

Of our ending music denoted by sitar and violin

With beating tabla and drumbeat combined

Writhing to a melancholic zen

Ravi Shankar - Mangalam - Rest in Peace

2012-12-11T21:51:00.001-07:00

Rest in peace Pandit Ravi Shankar. His death today is a great loss for the music lovers in all over the world.

The following is the lyric of one of this prominent music: Mangalam

Bhoomimangalam. Udakamangalam.

Agnimangalam. Vaayumangalam.

Gaganamangalam. Sooryamangalam.

Chandramangalam. Jagat Mangalam.

Jeevamangalam. Dehamangalam.

Manomangalam. Aatmamangalam.

Sarvamangalam Bhavatu Bhavatu Bhavatu.

"Prabhujee" is another great song by Ravi Shankar in collaboration with the great George Harrison. Both of these great musicians, artists with spiritual depth no longer are alive, but their transcending music live on.

English translation of the song Prabhujee is:

Oh Master, show some compassion on me,

Please come and dwell in my heart.

Because without you, it is painfully lonely,

Fill this empty pot with the nectar of love.

I do not know any Tantra, Mantra or ritualistic

worship i know and believe only in you.

I have been searching for you all over all the world,

please come and hold my hand now.

The original lyric:

Prabhujee dayaa karo

Maname aana baso.

Tuma bina laage soonaa

Khaali ghatame prema bharo.

Tantra mantra poojaa nahi jaanu

Mai to kevala tumako hi maanu.

Sare jaga me dhundaa tumako

Aba to aakara baahan dharo

The above video clip is from Concert for Bangladesh held in August 1, 1971 at Madison Square Garden in New York. This concert was arranged by Pandit Ravi Shankar and George Harrison for raising international awareness on 1971 war's atrocity in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan). In this video the musicians were: Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan and Allah Rakha.

Ravi Shankar's two daughters are accomplished artists themselves. The following video shows two sisters in a musical collaboration: Norah Jones and Anoushka Shankar.

Here is a video clip from two years ago where Ravi Shankar and his daughter Anoushka Shankar are performing together.

The following is a music video showing collaboration between two maestro of 20th century: Ravi Shankar and Phillip Glass:

Yehudi Menuhin is considered one of the greatest violinists of 20th century. Here is a music video where three maestros were in collaborations: Ravi Shankar in sitar, Yehudi Menuhin in violin and Allah Rakha in tabla.

Another great music by Ravi Shankar and Yehudi Menuhin:

This is a spiritual song by Ravi Shankar and George Harrison: Asato Maa

Song lyric of Asato Maa:

asato ma sadgamaya

tamaso ma jyotirgamaya

mrtyorma amrtam gamaya

Lead me from the asat to the sat.

Lead me from darkness to light.

Lead me from death to immortality.

Sat has a combination of meanings: existence, reality and truth.

Asat has a combination of meaning: Non-existence, non-reality and un-truth.

Of The Murderers in Bangladesh

2012-12-10T18:44:00.002-07:00

In the never ending list of murders, extortion, heart wrenching fires and all kind of criminal fiesta, the death of a simple businessman named Bishwajit Das in public view perhaps will be disappeared from newspapers' front pages in a few days. A new sensational news will replace the "old" news, with new blood spill, or the victory lap of the tigers and the wolves, the real ones, not the stuffed tigers or the wolves, but the ones hiding behind the gentle political smile will shed their deceitful skin and will reveal their true monstrous selves!

A video clip of this murder (Please don't see this if you are faint hearted)

Perhaps this time the people who have witnessed this merciless killing from near and far will not let their anger die down. Maybe this time around the people will not be distracted by empty political slogans.

The murderers' backgrounds are impressive.

Murderer number 1: Noore Alam is a fourth year university student, majoring in Political Science
Murderer number 2: Rafiqul Islam is a second year university student majoring in Islamic History
Murderer number 3: Mahfuzur Rahman is a final year Masters degree student in Bangla literature in the university
Murderer number 4: Obhidul Quader is a fourth year student of psychology
Murderer number 5: Emdadul Haque is a final year Masters degree student of philosophy
Murderer number 6: Rasheduzzaman Shaon is a fourth year student of history
Murderer number 7: Rintu is a fourth year student of English literature
Murderer number 8: Mohammad Uzzal is a fourth year student of social science

Philosophy, psychology, Bangla and English literature, political and social science and history - these subjects should have enlightened their mind, free their spirit to the realm of basic empathy, but instead they have hacked an innocent businessman Bishwajit Das, in broad daylight, in front of the shuttering cameras of numb media and ridiculously ineffective law enforcers watching only from yards away.

41 years ago in 1971, the known enemies from foreign land and their shameless collaborators killed countless innocent civilians, men, women, and children, murdered professors, students, doctors, engineers and civil servants. It was a brutal war, though in the end the innocence had triumphed over the oppression.

Bangladesh has come a long way since then. Many decades have passed, military dictators of by gone era are only the fading memories. But if one compares the blood soaked newspapers of today to a similar page from one, two or ten years ago, the brutality, the senseless violence, photos or words describing the thugs and murderers, the cries and agonies of aggrieved family emanating from newspapers' crispy pages, have not changed much. The players at the top, the ruling and the main oppositions swapped their positions, but their hired murderers' crass actions have remained the same.

The tragic part is that the powerful political elites have been exploiting college and university students to do their dirty deeds.

24 year old Bishwajit Das is dead and his body is already cremated by his family in a tearful funeral. Today was also International Human Rights Day. "This year the spotlight is on the rights of all people — women, youth, minorities, persons with disabilities, indigenous people, the poor and marginalized — to make their voices heard in public life and be included in political decision-making."

Bishwajit Das was part of minority in Bangladesh. His very basic right, to live freely, was taken away from him by murdering thugs working under political elites (Awami League? BNP?). Will there be any justice served for his murderers or behind the scene orchestrators?

References

1. Rashidul Hasan, Of The Murderers, The Daily Star, December 11, 2012. Link: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=260737
2. Rashidul Hasan, 3 Other Murderers, The Daily Star, December 13, 2012. Link: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=260958

Poems and Musical Devices

2012-11-27T20:57:00.001-07:00

I love poetry. The verses written with poetic devices are appealing to me. Writing the first draft of a poem may not be too difficult, but writing that musical, heart touching poem is not so easy. Reading many accomplished poets' memorable poems, a few poems writing guides and searching through the net, the following few rhyming techniques are gathered. Read it, but check with other references and examples.

When I was a child, my father taught me how to count words and syllables, but those were meant for poems written in Bangla. I followed his guidance and wrote Bengali poems. As I grew more fond toward English poems, I tried to use the similar techniques. Perhaps still naive, but my current understanding is that poetry in any language has strikingly similar flow and affinity to music through its internal devices.

The most common form of rhyming that I had learnt from my poet father was ending two lines with the same sounding words. Mastering this particular technique is not easy, but for many, poems mean rhyming in ending couplets. Here is a famous poem by Robert Frost using this technique:

Acquainted with the Night

BY ROBERT FROST

I have been one acquainted with the night.

I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.

I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.

I have passed by the watchman on his beat

And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet

When far away an interrupted cry

Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;

And further still at an unearthly height,

One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.

I have been one acquainted with the night.

Internal rhyming is another technique that poets use. A few that I have learnt are from the writer Steve Kowit from his book In the Palm of Your Hand are:

Assonance: This technique is for writing partial rhyme using identical vowel sounds.

For example, read the two lines below from the poet Raymond Carver's poem After-Glow:

The dusk of evening comes on. Earlier a little rain

had fallen. You open a drawer and find inside......

The author Steve Kowit pointed out that the words dusk, of and comes "have the same vowel sound". As a non native English speaker, I find this difficult to understand, but found these two lines' beautiful flow, and perhaps the assonance is part of the reasons. The next assonance example is in the words fallen and drawer that has the "awe" sounds inside these words. Hmm...no wonder why my heavily enunciated words get one or two raised eye brows on this side of the ocean!

Another example of assonance usage found in yourdictionary.com site, where the poet Edgar Allan Poe's few poems were used as examples. Assonance found in Poe's poem The Raven are, "ur", and "i":

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,

And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow

From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -

Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating`

'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -

Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -

This it is, and nothing more,'

Repetition: This is the term used for repetition of words or phrases in a poem. Like in Raymond Carver's After-Glow poem, the usage of the word "Know" is used multiple times along with the usage of "no" that rhymed with "know".

Here is the full poem After-Glow by Raymond Carver:

The dusk of evening comes on. Earlier a little rain

had fallen. You open a drawer and find inside

the man's photograph, knowing he has only two years

to live. He doesn't know this, of course,

that's why he can mug for the camera.

How could he know what's taking root in his head

at that moment? It one looks to the right

through boughs and tree trunks, there can be seen

crimson patches of the after-glow. Now shadows, no

half-shadows. It is still and damp....

The man goes on mugging. I put the picture back

in its place along with the others and give

my attention instead to the after-glow along the far ridge,

Then, I can't help myself, I glance once more

at the picture. The wink, the broad smile,

the jaunty slant of the cigarette.

Alliteration: The author Steve Kowit describes alliteration as the repetition of the initial consonant sound in words or syllables.

Example: Here is a poem written by poet Paul McCann found in vicnet.net.edu that has usage of alliteration in its full glory it seems:

Cipher Connected

Careless cars cutting corners create confusion .

Crossing centrelines.

Countless collisions cost coffins.

Collect conscious change.

Copy?

Continue cautiously.

Comply?

Cool .

Steve Kowit provided a shorter example of alliteration from poet Corrine Hales' poem "Power" that has consonant "b", "d", "g" and "w" repeated:

Hardly daring to breathe, I waited

Belly-down with my brother

In a dry ditch

Watching through the green thickness

of grass and willows.

Rich or Full Consonance: This is considered a rare technique. The technique is to use words that "begin and end with the same consonant sound but have differing vowel." Steve Kowit provides example from Raymond Carver's poem After-Glow (line 6 and 7):

How could he know what's taking root in his head

at that moment? It one looks to the right

In the above two lines, the words "root" and "right" have the same starting letter "r" and ends with the same consonant "t", but have different vowels, "o" and "i", respectively.

Partial Consonance (also known as Terminal Alliteration or simply as Consonance): This technique uses the repetition of consonant sounds in nearby or adjacent words. (Reference link). Here is a fragment of a poem by Emily Dickinson who was fond of consonance usage:

There is a pain - so utter--

It swallows substance up--

Then covers the Abyss with Trance--

So Memory can step

Around--across--upon it--

As one within a Swoon--

Goes safely--where an open eye--

would drop Him--Bone by Bone.

Another example found in Edgar Allan Poe's poem The Sleeper (Reference link):

"At midnight, in the month of June,

I stand beneath the mystic moon.

An opiate vapor, dewy, dim,

Exhales from out her golden rim,

And, softly dripping, drop by drop,

Upon the quiet mountain top,

Steals drowsily and musically

Into the universal valley."

Anaphora: Another poetic device that uses "the repetition of the opening word or phrase in several successive lines" - Steve Kowit

Here is an example from Walt Whitman's poem "Song of Myself":

Where the humming-bird shimmers, where the neck of the long-lived

swan is curving and winding,

Where the laughing-gull scoots by the shore, where she laughs her

near-human laugh,

Where bee-hives range on a gray bench in the garden half hid by the

high weeds,

Where band-neck'd partridges roost in a ring on the ground with

their heads out,

Where burial coaches enter the arch'd gates of a cemetery,

Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and icicled trees,

Where the yellow-crown'd heron comes to the edge of the marsh at

night and feeds upon small crabs,

Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the warm noon,

Where the katy-did works her chromatic reed on the walnut-tree over

the well,

If you read this poem fragment aloud, like Steve Kowit noted, the repetition of the word "Where" created a synergy and passionate tone, that just moves this gripping poem to a crescendo.

The starting of Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" is exquisite:

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,

I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,

Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their

parents the same,

I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,

Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,

Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,

I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,

Nature without check with original energy.

The full poem "Song to Myself" can be found in following link: http://www.daypoems.net/poems/1900.html and placed below for its sheer brilliance:

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,

I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,

Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their

parents the same,

I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,

Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,

Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,

I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,

Nature without check with original energy.

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes, the shelves are crowded with

perfumes,

I breathe the fragrance myself and know it and like it,

The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the

distillation, it is odorless,

It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,

I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,

I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

The smoke of my own breath,

Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and vine,

My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing

of blood and air through my lungs,

The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and

dark-color'd sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,

The sound of the belch'd words of my voice loos'd to the eddies of

the wind,

A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,

The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,

The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields

and hill-sides,

The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising

from bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon'd a thousand acres much? have you reckon'd the earth much?

Have you practis'd so long to learn to read?

Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of

all poems,

You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions

of suns left,)

You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through

the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,

You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,

You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the

beginning and the end,

But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,

Nor any more youth or age than there is now,

And will never be any more perfection than there is now,

Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

Urge and urge and urge,

Always the procreant urge of the world.

Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always substance and

increase, always sex,

Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed of life.

To elaborate is no avail, learn'd and unlearn'd feel that it is so.

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well

entretied, braced in the beams,

Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,

I and this mystery here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is not my soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,

Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,

Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they

discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty and clean,

Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be

less familiar than the rest.

I am satisfied--I see, dance, laugh, sing;

As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the night,

and withdraws at the peep of the day with stealthy tread,

Leaving me baskets cover'd with white towels swelling the house with

their plenty,

Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream at my eyes,

That they turn from gazing after and down the road,

And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,

Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and which is ahead?

Trippers and askers surround me,

People I meet, the effect upon me of my early life or the ward and

city I live in, or the nation,

The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, authors old and new,

My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues,

The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,

The sickness of one of my folks or of myself, or ill-doing or loss

or lack of money, or depressions or exaltations,

Battles, the horrors of fratricidal war, the fever of doubtful news,

the fitful events;

These come to me days and nights and go from me again,

But they are not the Me myself.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,

Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,

Looks down, is erect, or bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,

Looking with side-curved head curious what will come next,

Both in and out of the game and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with

linguists and contenders,

I have no mockings or arguments, I witness and wait.

I believe in you my soul, the other I am must not abase itself to you,

And you must not be abased to the other.

Loafe with me on the grass, loose the stop from your throat,

Not words, not music or rhyme I want, not custom or lecture, not

even the best,

Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice.

I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning,

How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn'd over upon me,

And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue

to my bare-stript heart,

And reach'd till you felt my beard, and reach'd till you held my feet.

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass

all the argument of the earth,

And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,

And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own,

And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women

my sisters and lovers,

And that a kelson of the creation is love,

And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields,

And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,

And mossy scabs of the worm fence, heap'd stones, elder, mullein and

poke-weed.

A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;

How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green

stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,

A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,

Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see

and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,

And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,

Growing among black folks as among white,

Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I

receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass,

It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,

It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,

It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out

of their mothers' laps,

And here you are the mothers' laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,

Darker than the colorless beards of old men,

Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,

And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women,

And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken

soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men?

And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere,

The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,

And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the

end to arrest it,

And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,

And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?

I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know it.

I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash'd babe, and

am not contain'd between my hat and boots,

And peruse manifold objects, no two alike and every one good,

The earth good and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.

I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,

I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and

fathomless as myself,

(They do not know how immortal, but I know.)

Every kind for itself and its own, for me mine male and female,

For me those that have been boys and that love women,

For me the man that is proud and feels how it stings to be slighted,

For me the sweet-heart and the old maid, for me mothers and the

mothers of mothers,

For me lips that have smiled, eyes that have shed tears,

For me children and the begetters of children.

Undrape! you are not guilty to me, nor stale nor discarded,

I see through the broadcloth and gingham whether or no,

And am around, tenacious, acquisitive, tireless, and cannot be shaken away.

The little one sleeps in its cradle,

I lift the gauze and look a long time, and silently brush away flies

with my hand.

The youngster and the red-faced girl turn aside up the bushy hill,

I peeringly view them from the top.

The suicide sprawls on the bloody floor of the bedroom,

I witness the corpse with its dabbled hair, I note where the pistol

has fallen.

The blab of the pave, tires of carts, sluff of boot-soles, talk of

the promenaders,

The heavy omnibus, the driver with his interrogating thumb, the

clank of the shod horses on the granite floor,

The snow-sleighs, clinking, shouted jokes, pelts of snow-balls,

The hurrahs for popular favorites, the fury of rous'd mobs,

The flap of the curtain'd litter, a sick man inside borne to the hospital,

The meeting of enemies, the sudden oath, the blows and fall,

The excited crowd, the policeman with his star quickly working his

passage to the centre of the crowd,

The impassive stones that receive and return so many echoes,

What groans of over-fed or half-starv'd who fall sunstruck or in fits,

What exclamations of women taken suddenly who hurry home and

give birth to babes,

What living and buried speech is always vibrating here, what howls

restrain'd by decorum,

Arrests of criminals, slights, adulterous offers made, acceptances,

rejections with convex lips,

I mind them or the show or resonance of them--I come and I depart.

The big doors of the country barn stand open and ready,

The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon,

The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged,

The armfuls are pack'd to the sagging mow.

I am there, I help, I came stretch'd atop of the load,

I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other,

I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy,

And roll head over heels and tangle my hair full of wisps.

Alone far in the wilds and mountains I hunt,

Wandering amazed at my own lightness and glee,

In the late afternoon choosing a safe spot to pass the night,

Kindling a fire and broiling the fresh-kill'd game,

Falling asleep on the gather'd leaves with my dog and gun by my side.

The Yankee clipper is under her sky-sails, she cuts the sparkle and scud,

My eyes settle the land, I bend at her prow or shout joyously from the deck.

The boatmen and clam-diggers arose early and stopt for me,

I tuck'd my trowser-ends in my boots and went and had a good time;

You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle.

I saw the marriage of the trapper in the open air in the far west,

the bride was a red girl,

Her father and his friends sat near cross-legged and dumbly smoking,

they had moccasins to their feet and large thick blankets

hanging from their shoulders,

On a bank lounged the trapper, he was drest mostly in skins, his luxuriant

beard and curls protected his neck, he held his bride by the hand,

She had long eyelashes, her head was bare, her coarse straight locks

descended upon her voluptuous limbs and reach'd to her feet.

The runaway slave came to my house and stopt outside,

I heard his motions crackling the twigs of the woodpile,

Through the swung half-door of the kitchen I saw him limpsy and weak,

And went where he sat on a log and led him in and assured him,

And brought water and fill'd a tub for his sweated body and bruis'd feet,

And gave him a room that enter'd from my own, and gave him some

coarse clean clothes,

And remember perfectly well his revolving eyes and his awkwardness,

And remember putting piasters on the galls of his neck and ankles;

He staid with me a week before he was recuperated and pass'd north,

I had him sit next me at table, my fire-lock lean'd in the corner.

Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,

Twenty-eight young men and all so friendly;

Twenty-eight years of womanly life and all so lonesome.

She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank,

She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of the window.

Which of the young men does she like the best?

Ah the homeliest of them is beautiful to her.

Where are you off to, lady? for I see you,

You splash in the water there, yet stay stock still in your room.

Dancing and laughing along the beach came the twenty-ninth bather,

The rest did not see her, but she saw them and loved them.

The beards of the young men glisten'd with wet, it ran from their long hair,

Little streams pass'd all over their bodies.

An unseen hand also pass'd over their bodies,

It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs.

The young men float on their backs, their white bellies bulge to the

sun, they do not ask who seizes fast to them,

They do not know who puffs and declines with pendant and bending arch,

They do not think whom they souse with spray.

The butcher-boy puts off his killing-clothes, or sharpens his knife

at the stall in the market,

I loiter enjoying his repartee and his shuffle and break-down.

Blacksmiths with grimed and hairy chests environ the anvil,

Each has his main-sledge, they are all out, there is a great heat in

the fire.

From the cinder-strew'd threshold I follow their movements,

The lithe sheer of their waists plays even with their massive arms,

Overhand the hammers swing, overhand so slow, overhand so sure,

They do not hasten, each man hits in his place.

The negro holds firmly the reins of his four horses, the block swags

underneath on its tied-over chain,

The negro that drives the long dray of the stone-yard, steady and

tall he stands pois'd on one leg on the string-piece,

His blue shirt exposes his ample neck and breast and loosens over

his hip-band,

His glance is calm and commanding, he tosses the slouch of his hat

away from his forehead,

The sun falls on his crispy hair and mustache, falls on the black of

his polish'd and perfect limbs.

I behold the picturesque giant and love him, and I do not stop there,

I go with the team also.

In me the caresser of life wherever moving, backward as well as

forward sluing,

To niches aside and junior bending, not a person or object missing,

Absorbing all to myself and for this song.

Oxen that rattle the yoke and chain or halt in the leafy shade, what

is that you express in your eyes?

It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.

My tread scares the wood-drake and wood-duck on my distant and

day-long ramble,

They rise together, they slowly circle around.

I believe in those wing'd purposes,

And acknowledge red, yellow, white, playing within me,

And consider green and violet and the tufted crown intentional,

And do not call the tortoise unworthy because she is not something else,

And the in the woods never studied the gamut, yet trills pretty well to me,

And the look of the bay mare shames silliness out of me.

The wild gander leads his flock through the cool night,

Ya-honk he says, and sounds it down to me like an invitation,

The pert may suppose it meaningless, but I listening close,

Find its purpose and place up there toward the wintry sky.

The sharp-hoof'd moose of the north, the cat on the house-sill, the

chickadee, the prairie-dog,

The litter of the grunting sow as they tug at her teats,

The brood of the turkey-hen and she with her half-spread wings,

I see in them and myself the same old law.

The press of my foot to the earth springs a hundred affections,

They scorn the best I can do to relate them.

I am enamour'd of growing out-doors,

Of men that live among cattle or taste of the ocean or woods,

Of the builders and steerers of ships and the wielders of axes and

mauls, and the drivers of horses,

I can eat and sleep with them week in and week out.

What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me,

Me going in for my chances, spending for vast returns,

Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that will take me,

Not asking the sky to come down to my good will,

Scattering it freely forever.

The pure contralto sings in the organ loft,

The carpenter dresses his plank, the tongue of his foreplane

whistles its wild ascending lisp,

The married and unmarried children ride home to their Thanksgiving dinner,

The pilot seizes the king-pin, he heaves down with a strong arm,

The mate stands braced in the whale-boat, lance and harpoon are ready,

The duck-shooter walks by silent and cautious stretches,

The deacons are ordain'd with cross'd hands at the altar,

The spinning-girl retreats and advances to the hum of the big wheel,

The farmer stops by the bars as he walks on a First-day loafe and

looks at the oats and rye,

The lunatic is carried at last to the asylum a confirm'd case,

(He will never sleep any more as he did in the cot in his mother's

bed-room;)

The jour printer with gray head and gaunt jaws works at his case,

He turns his quid of tobacco while his eyes blurr with the manuscript;

The malform'd limbs are tied to the surgeon's table,

What is removed drops horribly in a pail;

The quadroon girl is sold at the auction-stand, the drunkard nods by

the bar-room stove,

The machinist rolls up his sleeves, the policeman travels his beat,

the gate-keeper marks who pass,

The young fellow drives the express-wagon, (I love him, though I do

not know him;)

The half-breed straps on his light boots to compete in the race,

The western turkey-shooting draws old and young, some lean on their

rifles, some sit on logs,

Out from the crowd steps the marksman, takes his position, levels his piece;

The groups of newly-come immigrants cover the wharf or levee,

As the woolly-pates hoe in the sugar-field, the overseer views them

from his saddle,

The bugle calls in the ball-room, the gentlemen run for their

partners, the dancers bow to each other,

The youth lies awake in the cedar-roof'd garret and harks to the

musical rain,

The Wolverine sets traps on the creek that helps fill the Huron,

The squaw wrapt in her yellow-hemm'd cloth is offering moccasins and

bead-bags for sale,

The connoisseur peers along the exhibition-gallery with half-shut

eyes bent sideways,

As the deck-hands make fast the steamboat the plank is thrown for

the shore-going passengers,

The young sister holds out the skein while the elder sister winds it

off in a ball, and stops now and then for the knots,

The one-year wife is recovering and happy having a week ago borne

her first child,

The clean-hair'd Yankee girl works with her sewing-machine or in the

factory or mill,

The paving-man leans on his two-handed rammer, the reporter's lead

flies swiftly over the note-book, the sign-painter is lettering

with blue and gold,

The canal boy trots on the tow-path, the book-keeper counts at his

desk, the shoemaker waxes his thread,

The conductor beats time for the band and all the performers follow him,

The child is baptized, the convert is making his first professions,

The regatta is spread on the bay, the race is begun, (how the white

sails sparkle!)

The drover watching his drove sings out to them that would stray,

The pedler sweats with his pack on his back, (the purchaser higgling

about the odd cent;)

The bride unrumples her white dress, the minute-hand of the clock

moves slowly,

The opium-eater reclines with rigid head and just-open'd lips,

The prostitute draggles her shawl, her bonnet bobs on her tipsy and

pimpled neck,

The crowd laugh at her blackguard oaths, the men jeer and wink to

each other,

(Miserable! I do not laugh at your oaths nor jeer you;)

The President holding a cabinet council is surrounded by the great

Secretaries,

On the piazza walk three matrons stately and friendly with twined arms,

The crew of the fish-smack pack repeated layers of halibut in the hold,

The Missourian crosses the plains toting his wares and his cattle,

As the fare-collector goes through the train he gives notice by the

jingling of loose change,

The floor-men are laying the floor, the tinners are tinning the

roof, the masons are calling for mortar,

In single file each shouldering his hod pass onward the laborers;

Seasons pursuing each other the indescribable crowd is gather'd, it

is the fourth of Seventh-month, (what salutes of cannon and small arms!)

Seasons pursuing each other the plougher ploughs, the mower mows,

and the winter-grain falls in the ground;

Off on the lakes the pike-fisher watches and waits by the hole in

the frozen surface,

The stumps stand thick round the clearing, the squatter strikes deep

with his axe,

Flatboatmen make fast towards dusk near the cotton-wood or pecan-trees,

Coon-seekers go through the regions of the Red river or through

those drain'd by the Tennessee, or through those of the Arkansas,

Torches shine in the dark that hangs on the Chattahooche or Altamahaw,

Patriarchs sit at supper with sons and grandsons and great-grandsons

around them,

In walls of adobie, in canvas tents, rest hunters and trappers after

their day's sport,

The city sleeps and the country sleeps,

The living sleep for their time, the dead sleep for their time,

The old husband sleeps by his wife and the young husband sleeps by his wife;

And these tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them,

And such as it is to be of these more or less I am,

And of these one and all I weave the song of myself.

I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,

Regardless of others, ever regardful of others,

Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man,

Stuff'd with the stuff that is coarse and stuff'd with the stuff

that is fine,

One of the Nation of many nations, the smallest the same and the

largest the same,

A Southerner soon as a Northerner, a planter nonchalant and

hospitable down by the Oconee I live,

A Yankee bound my own way ready for trade, my joints the limberest

joints on earth and the sternest joints on earth,

A Kentuckian walking the vale of the Elkhorn in my deer-skin

leggings, a Louisianian or Georgian,

A boatman over lakes or bays or along coasts, a Hoosier, Badger, Buckeye;

At home on Kanadian snow-shoes or up in the bush, or with fishermen

off Newfoundland,

At home in the fleet of ice-boats, sailing with the rest and tacking,

At home on the hills of Vermont or in the woods of Maine, or the

Texan ranch,

Comrade of Californians, comrade of free North-Westerners, (loving

their big proportions,)

Comrade of raftsmen and coalmen, comrade of all who shake hands

and welcome to drink and meat,

A learner with the simplest, a teacher of the thoughtfullest,

A novice beginning yet experient of myriads of seasons,

Of every hue and caste am I, of every rank and religion,

A farmer, mechanic, artist, gentleman, sailor, quaker,

Prisoner, fancy-man, rowdy, lawyer, physician, priest.

I resist any thing better than my own diversity,

Breathe the air but leave plenty after me,

And am not stuck up, and am in my place.

(The moth and the fish-eggs are in their place,

The bright suns I see and the dark suns I cannot see are in their place,

The palpable is in its place and the impalpable is in its place.)

These are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they

are not original with me,

If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing, or next to nothing,

If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing,

If they are not just as close as they are distant they are nothing.

This is the grass that grows wherever the land is and the water is,

This the common air that bathes the globe.

With music strong I come, with my cornets and my drums,

I play not marches for accepted victors only, I play marches for

conquer'd and slain persons.

Have you heard that it was good to gain the day?

I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit

in which they are won.

I beat and pound for the dead,

I blow through my embouchures my loudest and gayest for them.

Vivas to those who have fail'd!

And to those whose war-vessels sank in the sea!

And to those themselves who sank in the sea!

And to all generals that lost engagements, and all overcome heroes!

And the numberless unknown heroes equal to the greatest heroes known!

This is the meal equally set, this the meat for natural hunger,

It is for the wicked just same as the righteous, I make appointments

with all,

I will not have a single person slighted or left away,

The kept-woman, sponger, thief, are hereby invited,

The heavy-lipp'd slave is invited, the venerealee is invited;

There shall be no difference between them and the rest.

This is the press of a bashful hand, this the float and odor of hair,

This the touch of my lips to yours, this the murmur of yearning,

This the far-off depth and height reflecting my own face,

This the thoughtful merge of myself, and the outlet again.

Do you guess I have some intricate purpose?

Well I have, for the Fourth-month showers have, and the mica on the

side of a rock has.

Do you take it I would astonish?

Does the daylight astonish? does the early redstart twittering

through the woods?

Do I astonish more than they?

This hour I tell things in confidence,

I might not tell everybody, but I will tell you.

Who goes there? hankering, gross, mystical, nude;

How is it I extract strength from the beef I eat?

What is a man anyhow? what am I? what are you?

All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own,

Else it were time lost listening to me.

I do not snivel that snivel the world over,

That months are vacuums and the ground but wallow and filth.

Whimpering and truckling fold with powders for invalids, conformity

goes to the fourth-remov'd,

I wear my hat as I please indoors or out.

Why should I pray? why should I venerate and be ceremonious?

Having pried through the strata, analyzed to a hair, counsel'd with

doctors and calculated close,

I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.

In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less,

And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.

I know I am solid and sound,

To me the converging objects of the universe perpetually flow,

All are written to me, and I must get what the writing means.

I know I am deathless,

I know this orbit of mine cannot be swept by a carpenter's compass,

I know I shall not pass like a child's carlacue cut with a burnt

stick at night.

I know I am august,

I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be understood,

I see that the elementary laws never apologize,

(I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by,

after all.)

I exist as I am, that is enough,

If no other in the world be aware I sit content,

And if each and all be aware I sit content.

One world is aware and by far the largest to me, and that is myself,

And whether I come to my own to-day or in ten thousand or ten

million years,

I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.

My foothold is tenon'd and mortis'd in granite,

I laugh at what you call dissolution,

And I know the amplitude of time.

I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,

The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,

The first I graft and increase upon myself, the latter I translate

into new tongue.

I am the poet of the woman the same as the man,

And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man,

And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.

I chant the chant of dilation or pride,

We have had ducking and deprecating about enough,

I show that size is only development.

Have you outstript the rest? are you the President?

It is a trifle, they will more than arrive there every one, and

still pass on.

I am he that walks with the tender and growing night,

I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night.

Press close bare-bosom'd night--press close magnetic nourishing night!

Night of south winds--night of the large few stars!

Still nodding night--mad naked summer night.

Smile O voluptuous cool-breath'd earth!

Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees!

Earth of departed sunset--earth of the mountains misty-topt!

Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue!

Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river!

Earth of the limpid gray of clouds brighter and clearer for my sake!

Far-swooping elbow'd earth--rich apple-blossom'd earth!

Smile, for your lover comes.

Prodigal, you have given me love--therefore I to you give love!

O unspeakable passionate love.

You sea! I resign myself to you also--I guess what you mean,

I behold from the beach your crooked fingers,

I believe you refuse to go back without feeling of me,

We must have a turn together, I undress, hurry me out of sight of the land,

Cushion me soft, rock me in billowy drowse,

Dash me with amorous wet, I can repay you.

Sea of stretch'd ground-swells,

Sea breathing broad and convulsive breaths,

Sea of the brine of life and of unshovell'd yet always-ready graves,

Howler and scooper of storms, capricious and dainty sea,

I am integral with you, I too am of one phase and of all phases.

Partaker of influx and efflux I, extoller of hate and conciliation,

Extoller of amies and those that sleep in each others' arms.

I am he attesting sympathy,

(Shall I make my list of things in the house and skip the house that

supports them?)

I am not the poet of goodness only, I do not decline to be the poet

of wickedness also.

What blurt is this about virtue and about vice?

Evil propels me and reform of evil propels me, I stand indifferent,

My gait is no fault-finder's or rejecter's gait,

I moisten the roots of all that has grown.

Did you fear some scrofula out of the unflagging pregnancy?

Did you guess the celestial laws are yet to be work'd over and rectified?

I find one side a balance and the antipedal side a balance,

Soft doctrine as steady help as stable doctrine,

Thoughts and deeds of the present our rouse and early start.

This minute that comes to me over the past decillions,

There is no better than it and now.

What behaved well in the past or behaves well to-day is not such wonder,

The wonder is always and always how there can be a mean man or an infidel.

Endless unfolding of words of ages!

And mine a word of the modern, the word En-Masse.

A word of the faith that never balks,

Here or henceforward it is all the same to me, I accept Time absolutely.

It alone is without flaw, it alone rounds and completes all,

That mystic baffling wonder alone completes all.

I accept Reality and dare not question it,

Materialism first and last imbuing.

Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration!

Fetch stonecrop mixt with cedar and branches of lilac,

This is the lexicographer, this the chemist, this made a grammar of

the old cartouches,

These mariners put the ship through dangerous unknown seas.

This is the geologist, this works with the scalper, and this is a

mathematician.

Gentlemen, to you the first honors always!

Your facts are useful, and yet they are not my dwelling,

I but enter by them to an area of my dwelling.

Less the reminders of properties told my words,

And more the reminders they of life untold, and of freedom and extrication,

And make short account of neuters and geldings, and favor men and

women fully equipt,

And beat the gong of revolt, and stop with fugitives and them that

plot and conspire.

Walt Whitman, a kosmos, of Manhattan the son,

Turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating, drinking and breeding,

No sentimentalist, no stander above men and women or apart from them,

No more modest than immodest.

Unscrew the locks from the doors!

Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!

Whoever degrades another degrades me,

And whatever is done or said returns at last to me.

Through me the afflatus surging and surging, through me the current

and index.

I speak the pass-word primeval, I give the sign of democracy,

By God! I will accept nothing which all cannot have their

counterpart of on the same terms.

Through me many long dumb voices,

Voices of the interminable generations of prisoners and slaves,

Voices of the diseas'd and despairing and of thieves and dwarfs,

Voices of cycles of preparation and accretion,

And of the threads that connect the stars, and of wombs and of the

father-stuff,

And of the rights of them the others are down upon,

Of the deform'd, trivial, flat, foolish, despised,

Fog in the air, beetles rolling balls of dung.

Through me forbidden voices,

Voices of sexes and lusts, voices veil'd and I remove the veil,

Voices indecent by me clarified and transfigur'd.

I do not press my fingers across my mouth,

I keep as delicate around the bowels as around the head and heart,

Copulation is no more rank to me than death is.

I believe in the flesh and the appetites,

Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me

is a miracle.

Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am

touch'd from,

The scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer,

This head more than churches, bibles, and all the creeds.

If I worship one thing more than another it shall be the spread of

my own body, or any part of it,

Translucent mould of me it shall be you!

Shaded ledges and rests it shall be you!

Firm masculine colter it shall be you!

Whatever goes to the tilth of me it shall be you!

You my rich blood! your milky stream pale strippings of my life!

Breast that presses against other breasts it shall be you!

My brain it shall be your occult convolutions!

Root of wash'd sweet-flag! timorous pond-snipe! nest of guarded

duplicate eggs! it shall be you!

Mix'd tussled hay of head, beard, brawn, it shall be you!

Trickling sap of maple, fibre of manly wheat, it shall be you!

Sun so generous it shall be you!

Vapors lighting and shading my face it shall be you!

You sweaty brooks and dews it shall be you!

Winds whose soft-tickling genitals rub against me it shall be you!

Broad muscular fields, branches of live oak, loving lounger in my

winding paths, it shall be you!

Hands I have taken, face I have kiss'd, mortal I have ever touch'd,

it shall be you.

I dote on myself, there is that lot of me and all so luscious,

Each moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy,

I cannot tell how my ankles bend, nor whence the cause of my faintest wish,

Nor the cause of the friendship I emit, nor the cause of the

friendship I take again.

That I walk up my stoop, I pause to consider if it really be,

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics

of books.

To behold the day-break!

The little light fades the immense and diaphanous shadows,

The air tastes good to my palate.

Hefts of the moving world at innocent gambols silently rising

freshly exuding,

Scooting obliquely high and low.

Something I cannot see puts upward libidinous prongs,

Seas of bright juice suffuse heaven.

The earth by the sky staid with, the daily close of their junction,

The heav'd challenge from the east that moment over my head,

The mocking taunt, See then whether you shall be master!

Dazzling and tremendous how quick the sun-rise would kill me,

If I could not now and always send sun-rise out of me.

We also ascend dazzling and tremendous as the sun,

We found our own O my soul in the calm and cool of the daybreak.

My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,

With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds.

Speech is the twin of my vision, it is unequal to measure itself,

It provokes me forever, it says sarcastically,

Walt you contain enough, why don't you let it out then?

Come now I will not be tantalized, you conceive too much of

articulation,

Do you not know O speech how the buds beneath you are folded?

Waiting in gloom, protected by frost,

The dirt receding before my prophetical screams,

I underlying causes to balance them at last,

My knowledge my live parts, it keeping tally with the meaning of all things,

Happiness, (which whoever hears me let him or her set out in search

of this day.)

My final merit I refuse you, I refuse putting from me what I really am,

Encompass worlds, but never try to encompass me,

I crowd your sleekest and best by simply looking toward you.

Writing and talk do not prove me,

I carry the plenum of proof and every thing else in my face,

With the hush of my lips I wholly confound the skeptic.

Now I will do nothing but listen,

To accrue what I hear into this song, to let sounds contribute toward it.

I hear bravuras of birds, bustle of growing wheat, gossip of flames,

clack of sticks cooking my meals,

I hear the sound I love, the sound of the human voice,

I hear all sounds running together, combined, fused or following,

Sounds of the city and sounds out of the city, sounds of the day and night,

Talkative young ones to those that like them, the loud laugh of

work-people at their meals,

The angry base of disjointed friendship, the faint tones of the sick,

The judge with hands tight to the desk, his pallid lips pronouncing

a death-sentence,

The heave'e'yo of stevedores unlading ships by the wharves, the

refrain of the anchor-lifters,

The ring of alarm-bells, the cry of fire, the whirr of swift-streaking

engines and hose-carts with premonitory tinkles and color'd lights,

The steam-whistle, the solid roll of the train of approaching cars,

The slow march play'd at the head of the association marching two and two,

(They go to guard some corpse, the flag-tops are draped with black muslin.)

I hear the violoncello, ('tis the young man's heart's complaint,)

I hear the key'd cornet, it glides quickly in through my ears,

It shakes mad-sweet pangs through my belly and breast.

I hear the chorus, it is a grand opera,

Ah this indeed is music--this suits me.

A tenor large and fresh as the creation fills me,

The orbic flex of his mouth is pouring and filling me full.

I hear the train'd soprano (what work with hers is this?)

The orchestra whirls me wider than Uranus flies,

It wrenches such ardors from me I did not know I possess'd them,

It sails me, I dab with bare feet, they are lick'd by the indolent waves,

I am cut by bitter and angry hail, I lose my breath,

Steep'd amid honey'd morphine, my windpipe throttled in fakes of death,

At length let up again to feel the puzzle of puzzles,

And that we call Being.

To be in any form, what is that?

(Round and round we go, all of us, and ever come back thither,)

If nothing lay more develop'd the quahaug in its callous shell were enough.

Mine is no callous shell,

I have instant conductors all over me whether I pass or stop,

They seize every object and lead it harmlessly through me.

I merely stir, press, feel with my fingers, and am happy,

To touch my person to some one else's is about as much as I can stand.

Is this then a touch? quivering me to a new identity,

Flames and ether making a rush for my veins,

Treacherous tip of me reaching and crowding to help them,

My flesh and blood playing out lightning to strike what is hardly

different from myself,

On all sides prurient provokers stiffening my limbs,

Straining the udder of my heart for its withheld drip,

Behaving licentious toward me, taking no denial,

Depriving me of my best as for a purpose,

Unbuttoning my clothes, holding me by the bare waist,

Deluding my confusion with the calm of the sunlight and pasture-fields,

Immodestly sliding the fellow-senses away,

They bribed to swap off with touch and go and graze at the edges of me,

No consideration, no regard for my draining strength or my anger,

Fetching the rest of the herd around to enjoy them a while,

Then all uniting to stand on a headland and worry me.

The sentries desert every other part of me,

They have left me helpless to a red marauder,

They all come to the headland to witness and assist against me.

I am given up by traitors,

I talk wildly, I have lost my wits, I and nobody else am the

greatest traitor,

I went myself first to the headland, my own hands carried me there.

You villain touch! what are you doing? my breath is tight in its throat,

Unclench your floodgates, you are too much for me.

Blind loving wrestling touch, sheath'd hooded sharp-tooth'd touch!

Did it make you ache so, leaving me?

Parting track'd by arriving, perpetual payment of perpetual loan,

Rich showering rain, and recompense richer afterward.

Sprouts take and accumulate, stand by the curb prolific and vital,

Landscapes projected masculine, full-sized and golden.

All truths wait in all things,

They neither hasten their own delivery nor resist it,

They do not need the obstetric forceps of the surgeon,

The insignificant is as big to me as any,

(What is less or more than a touch?)

Logic and sermons never convince,

The damp of the night drives deeper into my soul.

(Only what proves itself to every man and woman is so,

Only what nobody denies is so.)

A minute and a drop of me settle my brain,

I believe the soggy clods shall become lovers and lamps,

And a compend of compends is the meat of a man or woman,

And a summit and flower there is the feeling they have for each other,

And they are to branch boundlessly out of that lesson until it

becomes omnific,

And until one and all shall delight us, and we them.

I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey work of the stars,

And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg

of the wren,

And the tree-toad is a chef-d'oeuvre for the highest,

And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven,

And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery,

And the cow crunching with depress'd head surpasses any statue,

And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels.

I find I incorporate gneiss, coal, long-threaded moss, fruits,

grains, esculent roots,

And am stucco'd with quadrupeds and birds all over,

And have distanced what is behind me for good reasons,

But call any thing back again when I desire it.

In vain the speeding or shyness,

In vain the plutonic rocks send their old heat against my approach,

In vain the mastodon retreats beneath its own powder'd bones,

In vain objects stand leagues off and assume manifold shapes,

In vain the ocean settling in hollows and the great monsters lying low,

In vain the buzzard houses herself with the sky,

In vain the snake slides through the creepers and logs,

In vain the elk takes to the inner passes of the woods,

In vain the razor-bill'd auk sails far north to Labrador,

I follow quickly, I ascend to the nest in the fissure of the cliff.

I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and

self-contain'd,

I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition,

They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,

They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,

Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of

owning things,

Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of

years ago,

Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.

So they show their relations to me and I accept them,

They bring me tokens of myself, they evince them plainly in their

possession.

I wonder where they get those tokens,

Did I pass that way huge times ago and negligently drop them?

Myself moving forward then and now and forever,

Gathering and showing more always and with velocity,

Infinite and omnigenous, and the like of these among them,

Not too exclusive toward the reachers of my remembrancers,

Picking out here one that I love, and now go with him on brotherly terms.

A gigantic beauty of a stallion, fresh and responsive to my caresses,

Head high in the forehead, wide between the ears,

Limbs glossy and supple, tail dusting the ground,

Eyes full of sparkling wickedness, ears finely cut, flexibly moving.

His nostrils dilate as my heels embrace him,

His well-built limbs tremble with pleasure as we race around and return.

I but use you a minute, then I resign you, stallion,

Why do I need your paces when I myself out-gallop them?

Even as I stand or sit passing faster than you.

Space and Time! now I see it is true, what I guess'd at,

What I guess'd when I loaf'd on the grass,

What I guess'd while I lay alone in my bed,

And again as I walk'd the beach under the paling stars of the morning.

My ties and ballasts leave me, my elbows rest in sea-gaps,

I skirt sierras, my palms cover continents,

I am afoot with my vision.

By the city's quadrangular houses--in log huts, camping with lumber-men,

Along the ruts of the turnpike, along the dry gulch and rivulet bed,

Weeding my onion-patch or hosing rows of carrots and parsnips,

crossing savannas, trailing in forests,

Prospecting, gold-digging, girdling the trees of a new purchase,

Scorch'd ankle-deep by the hot sand, hauling my boat down the

shallow river,

Where the panther walks to and fro on a limb overhead, where the

buck turns furiously at the hunter,

Where the rattlesnake suns his flabby length on a rock, where the

otter is feeding on fish,

Where the alligator in his tough pimples sleeps by the bayou,

Where the black bear is searching for roots or honey, where the

beaver pats the mud with his paddle-shaped tall;

Over the growing sugar, over the yellow-flower'd cotton plant, over

the rice in its low moist field,

Over the sharp-peak'd farm house, with its scallop'd scum and

slender shoots from the gutters,

Over the western persimmon, over the long-leav'd corn, over the

delicate blue-flower flax,

Over the white and brown buckwheat, a hummer and buzzer there with

the rest,

Over the dusky green of the rye as it ripples and shades in the breeze;

Scaling mountains, pulling myself cautiously up, holding on by low

scragged limbs,

Walking the path worn in the grass and beat through the leaves of the brush,

Where the quail is whistling betwixt the woods and the wheat-lot,

Where the bat flies in the Seventh-month eve, where the great

goldbug drops through the dark,

Where the brook puts out of the roots of the old tree and flows to

the meadow,

Where cattle stand and shake away flies with the tremulous

shuddering of their hides,

Where the cheese-cloth hangs in the kitchen, where andirons straddle

the hearth-slab, where cobwebs fall in festoons from the rafters;

Where trip-hammers crash, where the press is whirling its cylinders,

Wherever the human heart beats with terrible throes under its ribs,

Where the pear-shaped balloon is floating aloft, (floating in it

myself and looking composedly down,)

Where the life-car is drawn on the slip-noose, where the heat

hatches pale-green eggs in the dented sand,

Where the she-whale swims with her calf and never forsakes it,

Where the steam-ship trails hind-ways its long pennant of smoke,

Where the fin of the shark cuts like a black chip out of the water,

Where the half-burn'd brig is riding on unknown currents,

Where shells grow to her slimy deck, where the dead are corrupting below;

Where the dense-starr'd flag is borne at the head of the regiments,

Approaching Manhattan up by the long-stretching island,

Under Niagara, the cataract falling like a veil over my countenance,

Upon a door-step, upon the horse-block of hard wood outside,

Upon the race-course, or enjoying picnics or jigs or a good game of

base-ball,

At he-festivals, with blackguard gibes, ironical license,

bull-dances, drinking, laughter,

At the cider-mill tasting the sweets of the brown mash, sucking the

juice through a straw,

At apple-peelings wanting kisses for all the red fruit I find,

At musters, beach-parties, friendly bees, huskings, house-raisings;

Where the mocking-bird sounds his delicious gurgles, cackles,

screams, weeps,

Where the hay-rick stands in the barn-yard, where the dry-stalks are

scatter'd, where the brood-cow waits in the hovel,

Where the bull advances to do his masculine work, where the stud to

the mare, where the cock is treading the hen,

Where the heifers browse, where geese nip their food with short jerks,

Where sun-down shadows lengthen over the limitless and lonesome prairie,

Where herds of buffalo make a crawling spread of the square miles

far and near,

Where the humming-bird shimmers, where the neck of the long-lived

swan is curving and winding,

Where the laughing-gull scoots by the shore, where she laughs her

near-human laugh,

Where bee-hives range on a gray bench in the garden half hid by the

high weeds,

Where band-neck'd partridges roost in a ring on the ground with

their heads out,

Where burial coaches enter the arch'd gates of a cemetery,

Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and icicled trees,

Where the yellow-crown'd heron comes to the edge of the marsh at

night and feeds upon small crabs,

Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the warm noon,

Where the katy-did works her chromatic reed on the walnut-tree over

the well,

Through patches of citrons and cucumbers with silver-wired leaves,

Through the salt-lick or orange glade, or under conical firs,

Through the gymnasium, through the curtain'd saloon, through the

office or public hall;

Pleas'd with the native and pleas'd with the foreign, pleas'd with

the new and old,

Pleas'd with the homely woman as well as the handsome,

Pleas'd with the quakeress as she puts off her bonnet and talks melodiously,

Pleas'd with the tune of the choir of the whitewash'd church,

Pleas'd with the earnest words of the sweating Methodist preacher,

impress'd seriously at the camp-meeting;

Looking in at the shop-windows of Broadway the whole forenoon,

flatting the flesh of my nose on the thick plate glass,

Wandering the same afternoon with my face turn'd up to the clouds,

or down a lane or along the beach,

My right and left arms round the sides of two friends, and I in the middle;

Coming home with the silent and dark-cheek'd bush-boy, (behind me

he rides at the drape of the day,)

Far from the settlements studying the print of animals' feet, or the

moccasin print,

By the cot in the hospital reaching lemonade to a feverish patient,

Nigh the coffin'd corpse when all is still, examining with a candle;

Voyaging to every port to dicker and adventure,

Hurrying with the modern crowd as eager and fickle as any,

Hot toward one I hate, ready in my madness to knife him,

Solitary at midnight in my back yard, my thoughts gone from me a long while,

Walking the old hills of Judaea with the beautiful gentle God by my side,

Speeding through space, speeding through heaven and the stars,

Speeding amid the seven satellites and the broad ring, and the

diameter of eighty thousand miles,

Speeding with tail'd meteors, throwing fire-balls like the rest,

Carrying the crescent child that carries its own full mother in its belly,

Storming, enjoying, planning, loving, cautioning,

Backing and filling, appearing and disappearing,

I tread day and night such roads.

I visit the orchards of spheres and look at the product,

And look at quintillions ripen'd and look at quintillions green.

I fly those flights of a fluid and swallowing soul,

My course runs below the soundings of plummets.

I help myself to material and immaterial,

No guard can shut me off, no law prevent me.

I anchor my ship for a little while only,

My messengers continually cruise away or bring their returns to me.

I go hunting polar furs and the seal, leaping chasms with a

pike-pointed staff, clinging to topples of brittle and blue.

I ascend to the foretruck,

I take my place late at night in the crow's-nest,

We sail the arctic sea, it is plenty light enough,

Through the clear atmosphere I stretch around on the wonderful beauty,

The enormous masses of ice pass me and I pass them, the scenery is

plain in all directions,

The white-topt mountains show in the distance, I fling out my

fancies toward them,

We are approaching some great battle-field in which we are soon to

be engaged,

We pass the colossal outposts of the encampment, we pass with still

feet and caution,

Or we are entering by the suburbs some vast and ruin'd city,

The blocks and fallen architecture more than all the living cities

of the globe.

I am a free companion, I bivouac by invading watchfires,

I turn the bridgroom out of bed and stay with the bride myself,

I tighten her all night to my thighs and lips.

My voice is the wife's voice, the screech by the rail of the stairs,

They fetch my man's body up dripping and drown'd.

I understand the large hearts of heroes,

The courage of present times and all times,

How the skipper saw the crowded and rudderless wreck of the

steamship, and Death chasing it up and down the storm,

How he knuckled tight and gave not back an inch, and was faithful of

days and faithful of nights,

And chalk'd in large letters on a board, Be of good cheer, we will

not desert you;

How he follow'd with them and tack'd with them three days and

would not give it up,

How he saved the drifting company at last,

How the lank loose-gown'd women look'd when boated from the

side of their prepared graves,

How the silent old-faced infants and the lifted sick, and the

sharp-lipp'd unshaved men;

All this I swallow, it tastes good, I like it well, it becomes mine,

I am the man, I suffer'd, I was there.

The disdain and calmness of martyrs,

The mother of old, condemn'd for a witch, burnt with dry wood, her

children gazing on,

The hounded slave that flags in the race, leans by the fence,

blowing, cover'd with sweat,

The twinges that sting like needles his legs and neck, the murderous

buckshot and the bullets,

All these I feel or am.

I am the hounded slave, I wince at the bite of the dogs,

Hell and despair are upon me, crack and again crack the marksmen,

I clutch the rails of the fence, my gore dribs, thinn'd with the

ooze of my skin,

I fall on the weeds and stones,

The riders spur their unwilling horses, haul close,

Taunt my dizzy ears and beat me violently over the head with whip-stocks.

Agonies are one of my changes of garments,

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the

wounded person,

My hurts turn livid upon me as I lean on a cane and observe.

I am the mash'd fireman with breast-bone broken,

Tumbling walls buried me in their debris,

Heat and smoke I inspired, I heard the yelling shouts of my comrades,

I heard the distant click of their picks and shovels,

They have clear'd the beams away, they tenderly lift me forth.

I lie in the night air in my red shirt, the pervading hush is for my sake,

Painless after all I lie exhausted but not so unhappy,

White and beautiful are the faces around me, the heads are bared

of their fire-caps,

The kneeling crowd fades with the light of the torches.

Distant and dead resuscitate,

They show as the dial or move as the hands of me, I am the clock myself.

I am an old artillerist, I tell of my fort's bombardment,

I am there again.

Again the long roll of the drummers,

Again the attacking cannon, mortars,

Again to my listening ears the cannon responsive.

I take part, I see and hear the whole,

The cries, curses, roar, the plaudits for well-aim'd shots,

The ambulanza slowly passing trailing its red drip,

Workmen searching after damages, making indispensable repairs,

The fall of grenades through the rent roof, the fan-shaped explosion,

The whizz of limbs, heads, stone, wood, iron, high in the air.

Again gurgles the mouth of my dying general, he furiously waves

with his hand,

He gasps through the clot Mind not me--mind--the entrenchments.

Now I tell what I knew in Texas in my early youth,

(I tell not the fall of Alamo,

Not one escaped to tell the fall of Alamo,

The hundred and fifty are dumb yet at Alamo,)

'Tis the tale of the murder in cold blood of four hundred and twelve

young men.

Retreating they had form'd in a hollow square with their baggage for

breastworks,

Nine hundred lives out of the surrounding enemies, nine times their

number, was the price they took in advance,

Their colonel was wounded and their ammunition gone,

They treated for an honorable capitulation, receiv'd writing and

seal, gave up their arms and march'd back prisoners of war.

They were the glory of the race of rangers,

Matchless with horse, rifle, song, supper, courtship,

Large, turbulent, generous, handsome, proud, and affectionate,

Bearded, sunburnt, drest in the free costume of hunters,

Not a single one over thirty years of age.

The second First-day morning they were brought out in squads and

massacred, it was beautiful early summer,

The work commenced about five o'clock and was over by eight.

None obey'd the command to kneel,

Some made a mad and helpless rush, some stood stark and straight,

A few fell at once, shot in the temple or heart, the living and dead

lay together,

The maim'd and mangled dug in the dirt, the new-comers saw them there,

Some half-kill'd attempted to crawl away,

These were despatch'd with bayonets or batter'd with the blunts of muskets,

A youth not seventeen years old seiz'd his assassin till two more

came to release him,

The three were all torn and cover'd with the boy's blood.

At eleven o'clock began the burning of the bodies;

That is the tale of the murder of the four hundred and twelve young men.

Would you hear of an old-time sea-fight?

Would you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars?

List to the yarn, as my grandmother's father the sailor told it to me.

Our foe was no sulk in his ship I tell you, (said he,)

His was the surly English pluck, and there is no tougher or truer,

and never was, and never will be;

Along the lower'd eve he came horribly raking us.

We closed with him, the yards entangled, the cannon touch'd,

My captain lash'd fast with his own hands.

We had receiv'd some eighteen pound shots under the water,

On our lower-gun-deck two large pieces had burst at the first fire,

killing all around and blowing up overhead.

Fighting at sun-down, fighting at dark,

Ten o'clock at night, the full moon well up, our leaks on the gain,

and five feet of water reported,

The master-at-arms loosing the prisoners confined in the after-hold

to give them a chance for themselves.

The transit to and from the magazine is now stopt by the sentinels,

They see so many strange faces they do not know whom to trust.

Our frigate takes fire,

The other asks if we demand quarter?

If our colors are struck and the fighting done?

Now I laugh content, for I hear the voice of my little captain,

We have not struck, he composedly cries, we have just begun our part

of the fighting.

Only three guns are in use,

One is directed by the captain himself against the enemy's main-mast,

Two well serv'd with grape and canister silence his musketry and

clear his decks.

The tops alone second the fire of this little battery, especially

the main-top,

They hold out bravely during the whole of the action.

Not a moment's cease,

The leaks gain fast on the pumps, the fire eats toward the powder-magazine.

One of the pumps has been shot away, it is generally thought we are sinking.

Serene stands the little captain,

He is not hurried, his voice is neither high nor low,

His eyes give more light to us than our battle-lanterns.

Toward twelve there in the beams of the moon they surrender to us.

Stretch'd and still lies the midnight,

Two great hulls motionless on the breast of the darkness,

Our vessel riddled and slowly sinking, preparations to pass to the

one we have conquer'd,

The captain on the quarter-deck coldly giving his orders through a

countenance white as a sheet,

Near by the corpse of the child that serv'd in the cabin,

The dead face of an old salt with long white hair and carefully

curl'd whiskers,

The flames spite of all that can be done flickering aloft and below,

The husky voices of the two or three officers yet fit for duty,

Formless stacks of bodies and bodies by themselves, dabs of flesh

upon the masts and spars,

Cut of cordage, dangle of rigging, slight shock of the soothe of waves,

Black and impassive guns, litter of powder-parcels, strong scent,

A few large stars overhead, silent and mournful shining,

Delicate sniffs of sea-breeze, smells of sedgy grass and fields by

the shore, death-messages given in charge to survivors,

The hiss of the surgeon's knife, the gnawing teeth of his saw,

Wheeze, cluck, swash of falling blood, short wild scream, and long,

dull, tapering groan,

These so, these irretrievable.

You laggards there on guard! look to your arms!

In at the conquer'd doors they crowd! I am possess'd!

Embody all presences outlaw'd or suffering,

See myself in prison shaped like another man,

And feel the dull unintermitted pain.

For me the keepers of convicts shoulder their carbines and keep watch,

It is I let out in the morning and barr'd at night.

Not a mutineer walks handcuff'd to jail but I am handcuff'd to him

and walk by his side,

(I am less the jolly one there, and more the silent one with sweat

on my twitching lips.)

Not a youngster is taken for larceny but I go up too, and am tried

and sentenced.

Not a cholera patient lies at the last gasp but I also lie at the last gasp,

My face is ash-color'd, my sinews gnarl, away from me people retreat.

Askers embody themselves in me and I am embodied in them,

I project my hat, sit shame-faced, and beg.

Enough! enough! enough!

Somehow I have been stunn'd. Stand back!

Give me a little time beyond my cuff'd head, slumbers, dreams, gaping,

I discover myself on the verge of a usual mistake.

That I could forget the mockers and insults!

That I could forget the trickling tears and the blows of the

bludgeons and hammers!

That I could look with a separate look on my own crucifixion and

bloody crowning.

I remember now,

I resume the overstaid fraction,

The grave of rock multiplies what has been confided to it, or to any graves,

Corpses rise, gashes heal, fastenings roll from me.

I troop forth replenish'd with supreme power, one of an average

unending procession,

Inland and sea-coast we go, and pass all boundary lines,

Our swift ordinances on their way over the whole earth,

The blossoms we wear in our hats the growth of thousands of years.

Eleves, I salute you! come forward!

Continue your annotations, continue your questionings.

The friendly and flowing savage, who is he?

Is he waiting for civilization, or past it and mastering it?

Is he some Southwesterner rais'd out-doors? is he Kanadian?

Is he from the Mississippi country? Iowa, Oregon, California?

The mountains? prairie-life, bush-life? or sailor from the sea?

Wherever he goes men and women accept and desire him,

They desire he should like them, touch them, speak to them, stay with them.

Behavior lawless as snow-flakes, words simple as grass, uncomb'd

head, laughter, and naivete,

Slow-stepping feet, common features, common modes and emanations,

They descend in new forms from the tips of his fingers,

They are wafted with the odor of his body or breath, they fly out of

the glance of his eyes.

Flaunt of the sunshine I need not your bask--lie over!

You light surfaces only, I force surfaces and depths also.

Earth! you seem to look for something at my hands,

Say, old top-knot, what do you want?

Man or woman, I might tell how I like you, but cannot,

And might tell what it is in me and what it is in you, but cannot,

And might tell that pining I have, that pulse of my nights and days.

Behold, I do not give lectures or a little charity,

When I give I give myself.

You there, impotent, loose in the knees,

Open your scarf'd chops till I blow grit within you,

Spread your palms and lift the flaps of your pockets,

I am not to be denied, I compel, I have stores plenty and to spare,

And any thing I have I bestow.

I do not ask who you are, that is not important to me,

You can do nothing and be nothing but what I will infold you.

To cotton-field drudge or cleaner of privies I lean,

On his right cheek I put the family kiss,

And in my soul I swear I never will deny him.

On women fit for conception I start bigger and nimbler babes.

(This day I am jetting the stuff of far more arrogant republics.)

To any one dying, thither I speed and twist the knob of the door.

Turn the bed-clothes toward the foot of the bed,

Let the physician and the priest go home.

I seize the descending man and raise him with resistless will,

O despairer, here is my neck,

By God, you shall not go down! hang your whole weight upon me.

I dilate you with tremendous breath, I buoy you up,

Every room of the house do I fill with an arm'd force,

Lovers of me, bafflers of graves.

Sleep--I and they keep guard all night,

Not doubt, not decease shall dare to lay finger upon you,

I have embraced you, and henceforth possess you to myself,

And when you rise in the morning you will find what I tell you is so.

I am he bringing help for the sick as they pant on their backs,

And for strong upright men I bring yet more needed help.

I heard what was said of the universe,

Heard it and heard it of several thousand years;

It is middling well as far as it goes--but is that all?

Magnifying and applying come I,

Outbidding at the start the old cautious hucksters,

Taking myself the exact dimensions of Jehovah,

Lithographing Kronos, Zeus his son, and Hercules his grandson,

Buying drafts of Osiris, Isis, Belus, Brahma, Buddha,

In my portfolio placing Manito loose, Allah on a leaf, the crucifix

engraved,

With Odin and the hideous-faced Mexitli and every idol and image,

Taking them all for what they are worth and not a cent more,

Admitting they were alive and did the work of their days,

(They bore mites as for unfledg'd birds who have now to rise and fly

and sing for themselves,)

Accepting the rough deific sketches to fill out better in myself,

bestowing them freely on each man and woman I see,

Discovering as much or more in a framer framing a house,

Putting higher claims for him there with his roll'd-up sleeves

driving the mallet and chisel,

Not objecting to special revelations, considering a curl of smoke or

a hair on the back of my hand just as curious as any revelation,

Lads ahold of fire-engines and hook-and-ladder ropes no less to me

than the gods of the antique wars,

Minding their voices peal through the crash of destruction,

Their brawny limbs passing safe over charr'd laths, their white

foreheads whole and unhurt out of the flames;

By the mechanic's wife with her babe at her nipple interceding for

every person born,

Three scythes at harvest whizzing in a row from three lusty angels

with shirts bagg'd out at their waists,

The snag-tooth'd hostler with red hair redeeming sins past and to come,

Selling all he possesses, traveling on foot to fee lawyers for his

brother and sit by him while he is tried for forgery;

What was strewn in the amplest strewing the square rod about me, and

not filling the square rod then,

The bull and the bug never worshipp'd half enough,

Dung and dirt more admirable than was dream'd,

The supernatural of no account, myself waiting my time to be one of

the supremes,

The day getting ready for me when I shall do as much good as the

best, and be as prodigious;

By my life-lumps! becoming already a creator,

Putting myself here and now to the ambush'd womb of the shadows.

A call in the midst of the crowd,

My own voice, orotund sweeping and final.

Come my children,

Come my boys and girls, my women, household and intimates,

Now the performer launches his nerve, he has pass'd his prelude on

the reeds within.

Easily written loose-finger'd chords--I feel the thrum of your

climax and close.

My head slues round on my neck,

Music rolls, but not from the organ,

Folks are around me, but they are no household of mine.

Ever the hard unsunk ground,

Ever the eaters and drinkers, ever the upward and downward sun, ever

the air and the ceaseless tides,

Ever myself and my neighbors, refreshing, wicked, real,

Ever the old inexplicable query, ever that thorn'd thumb, that

breath of itches and thirsts,

Ever the vexer's hoot! hoot! till we find where the sly one hides

and bring him forth,

Ever love, ever the sobbing liquid of life,

Ever the bandage under the chin, ever the trestles of death.

Here and there with dimes on the eyes walking,

To feed the greed of the belly the brains liberally spooning,

Tickets buying, taking, selling, but in to the feast never once going,

Many sweating, ploughing, thrashing, and then the chaff for payment

receiving,

A few idly owning, and they the wheat continually claiming.

This is the city and I am one of the citizens,

Whatever interests the rest interests me, politics, wars, markets,

newspapers, schools,

The mayor and councils, banks, tariffs, steamships, factories,

stocks, stores, real estate and personal estate.

The little plentiful manikins skipping around in collars and tail'd coats

I am aware who they are, (they are positively not worms or fleas,)

I acknowledge the duplicates of myself, the weakest and shallowest

is deathless with me,

What I do and say the same waits for them,

Every thought that flounders in me the same flounders in them.

I know perfectly well my own egotism,

Know my omnivorous lines and must not write any less,

And would fetch you whoever you are flush with myself.

Not words of routine this song of mine,

But abruptly to question, to leap beyond yet nearer bring;

This printed and bound book--but the printer and the

printing-office boy?

The well-taken photographs--but your wife or friend close and solid

in your arms?

The black ship mail'd with iron, her mighty guns in her turrets--but

the pluck of the captain and engineers?

In the houses the dishes and fare and furniture--but the host and

hostess, and the look out of their eyes?

The sky up there--yet here or next door, or across the way?

The saints and sages in history--but you yourself?

Sermons, creeds, theology--but the fathomless human brain,

And what is reason? and what is love? and what is life?

I do not despise you priests, all time, the world over,

My faith is the greatest of faiths and the least of faiths,

Enclosing worship ancient and modern and all between ancient and modern,

Believing I shall come again upon the earth after five thousand years,

Waiting responses from oracles, honoring the gods, saluting the sun,

Making a fetich of the first rock or stump, powowing with sticks in

the circle of obis,

Helping the llama or brahmin as he trims the lamps of the idols,

Dancing yet through the streets in a phallic procession, rapt and

austere in the woods a gymnosophist,

Drinking mead from the skull-cap, to Shastas and Vedas admirant,

minding the Koran,

Walking the teokallis, spotted with gore from the stone and knife,

beating the serpent-skin drum,

Accepting the Gospels, accepting him that was crucified, knowing

assuredly that he is divine,

To the mass kneeling or the puritan's prayer rising, or sitting

patiently in a pew,

Ranting and frothing in my insane crisis, or waiting dead-like till

my spirit arouses me,

Looking forth on pavement and land, or outside of pavement and land,

Belonging to the winders of the circuit of circuits.

One of that centripetal and centrifugal gang I turn and talk like

man leaving charges before a journey.

Down-hearted doubters dull and excluded,

Frivolous, sullen, moping, angry, affected, dishearten'd, atheistical,

I know every one of you, I know the sea of torment, doubt, despair

and unbelief.

How the flukes splash!

How they contort rapid as lightning, with spasms and spouts of blood!

Be at peace bloody flukes of doubters and sullen mopers,

I take my place among you as much as among any,

The past is the push of you, me, all, precisely the same,

And what is yet untried and afterward is for you, me, all, precisely

the same.

I do not know what is untried and afterward,

But I know it will in its turn prove sufficient, and cannot fail.

Each who passes is consider'd, each who stops is consider'd, not

single one can it fall.

It cannot fall the young man who died and was buried,

Nor the young woman who died and was put by his side,

Nor the little child that peep'd in at the door, and then drew back

and was never seen again,

Nor the old man who has lived without purpose, and feels it with

bitterness worse than gall,

Nor him in the poor house tubercled by rum and the bad disorder,

Nor the numberless slaughter'd and wreck'd, nor the brutish koboo

call'd the ordure of humanity,

Nor the sacs merely floating with open mouths for food to slip in,

Nor any thing in the earth, or down in the oldest graves of the earth,

Nor any thing in the myriads of spheres, nor the myriads of myriads

that inhabit them,

Nor the present, nor the least wisp that is known.

It is time to explain myself--let us stand up.

What is known I strip away,

I launch all men and women forward with me into the Unknown.

The clock indicates the moment--but what does eternity indicate?

We have thus far exhausted trillions of winters and summers,

There are trillions ahead, and trillions ahead of them.

Births have brought us richness and variety,

And other births will bring us richness and variety.

I do not call one greater and one smaller,

That which fills its period and place is equal to any.

Were mankind murderous or jealous upon you, my brother, my sister?

I am sorry for you, they are not murderous or jealous upon me,

All has been gentle with me, I keep no account with lamentation,

(What have I to do with lamentation?)

I am an acme of things accomplish'd, and I an encloser of things to be.

My feet strike an apex of the apices of the stairs,

On every step bunches of ages, and larger bunches between the steps,

All below duly travel'd, and still I mount and mount.

Rise after rise bow the phantoms behind me,

Afar down I see the huge first Nothing, I know I was even there,

I waited unseen and always, and slept through the lethargic mist,

And took my time, and took no hurt from the fetid carbon.

Long I was hugg'd close--long and long.

Immense have been the preparations for me,

Faithful and friendly the arms that have help'd me.

Cycles ferried my cradle, rowing and rowing like cheerful boatmen,

For room to me stars kept aside in their own rings,

They sent influences to look after what was to hold me.

Before I was born out of my mother generations guided me,

My embryo has never been torpid, nothing could overlay it.

For it the nebula cohered to an orb,

The long slow strata piled to rest it on,

Vast vegetables gave it sustenance,

Monstrous sauroids transported it in their mouths and deposited it

with care.

All forces have been steadily employ'd to complete and delight me,

Now on this spot I stand with my robust soul.

O span of youth! ever-push'd elasticity!

O manhood, balanced, florid and full.

My lovers suffocate me,

Crowding my lips, thick in the pores of my skin,

Jostling me through streets and public halls, coming naked to me at night,

Crying by day, Ahoy! from the rocks of the river, swinging and

chirping over my head,

Calling my name from flower-beds, vines, tangled underbrush,

Lighting on every moment of my life,

Bussing my body with soft balsamic busses,

Noiselessly passing handfuls out of their hearts and giving them to be mine.

Old age superbly rising! O welcome, ineffable grace of dying days!

Every condition promulges not only itself, it promulges what grows

after and out of itself,

And the dark hush promulges as much as any.

I open my scuttle at night and see the far-sprinkled systems,

And all I see multiplied as high as I can cipher edge but the rim of

the farther systems.

Wider and wider they spread, expanding, always expanding,

Outward and outward and forever outward.

My sun has his sun and round him obediently wheels,

He joins with his partners a group of superior circuit,

And greater sets follow, making specks of the greatest inside them.

There is no stoppage and never can be stoppage,

If I, you, and the worlds, and all beneath or upon their surfaces,

were this moment reduced back to a pallid float, it would

not avail the long run,

We should surely bring up again where we now stand,

And surely go as much farther, and then farther and farther.

A few quadrillions of eras, a few octillions of cubic leagues, do

not hazard the span or make it impatient,

They are but parts, any thing is but a part.

See ever so far, there is limitless space outside of that,

Count ever so much, there is limitless time around that.

My rendezvous is appointed, it is certain,

The Lord will be there and wait till I come on perfect terms,

The great Camerado, the lover true for whom I pine will be there.

I know I have the best of time and space, and was never measured and

never will be measured.

I tramp a perpetual journey, (come listen all!)

My signs are a rain-proof coat, good shoes, and a staff cut from the woods,

No friend of mine takes his ease in my chair,

I have no chair, no church, no philosophy,

I lead no man to a dinner-table, library, exchange,

But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll,

My left hand hooking you round the waist,

My right hand pointing to landscapes of continents and the public road.

Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you,

You must travel it for yourself.

It is not far, it is within reach,

Perhaps you have been on it since you were born and did not know,

Perhaps it is everywhere on water and on land.

Shoulder your duds dear son, and I will mine, and let us hasten forth,

Wonderful cities and free nations we shall fetch as we go.

If you tire, give me both burdens, and rest the chuff of your hand

on my hip,

And in due time you shall repay the same service to me,

For after we start we never lie by again.

This day before dawn I ascended a hill and look'd at the crowded heaven,

And I said to my spirit When we become the enfolders of those orbs,

and the pleasure and knowledge of every thing in them, shall we

be fill'd and satisfied then?

And my spirit said No, we but level that lift to pass and continue beyond.

You are also asking me questions and I hear you,

I answer that I cannot answer, you must find out for yourself.

Sit a while dear son,

Here are biscuits to eat and here is milk to drink,

But as soon as you sleep and renew yourself in sweet clothes, I kiss you

with a good-by kiss and open the gate for your egress hence.

Long enough have you dream'd contemptible dreams,

Now I wash the gum from your eyes,

You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light and of every

moment of your life.

Long have you timidly waded holding a plank by the shore,

Now I will you to be a bold swimmer,

To jump off in the midst of the sea, rise again, nod to me, shout,

and laughingly dash with your hair.

I am the teacher of athletes,

He that by me spreads a wider breast than my own proves the width of my own,

He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher.

The boy I love, the same becomes a man not through derived power,

but in his own right,

Wicked rather than virtuous out of conformity or fear,

Fond of his sweetheart, relishing well his steak,

Unrequited love or a slight cutting him worse than sharp steel cuts,

First-rate to ride, to fight, to hit the bull's eye, to sail a

skiff, to sing a song or play on the banjo,

Preferring scars and the beard and faces pitted with small-pox over

all latherers,

And those well-tann'd to those that keep out of the sun.

I teach straying from me, yet who can stray from me?

I follow you whoever you are from the present hour,

My words itch at your ears till you understand them.

I do not say these things for a dollar or to fill up the time while

I wait for a boat,

(It is you talking just as much as myself, I act as the tongue of you,

Tied in your mouth, in mine it begins to be loosen'd.)

I swear I will never again mention love or death inside a house,

And I swear I will never translate myself at all, only to him or her

who privately stays with me in the open air.

If you would understand me go to the heights or water-shore,

The nearest gnat is an explanation, and a drop or motion of waves key,

The maul, the oar, the hand-saw, second my words.

No shutter'd room or school can commune with me,

But roughs and little children better than they.

The young mechanic is closest to me, he knows me well,

The woodman that takes his axe and jug with him shall take me with

him all day,

The farm-boy ploughing in the field feels good at the sound of my voice,

In vessels that sail my words sail, I go with fishermen and seamen

and love them.

The soldier camp'd or upon the march is mine,

On the night ere the pending battle many seek me, and I do not fail them,

On that solemn night (it may be their last) those that know me seek me.

My face rubs to the hunter's face when he lies down alone in his blanket,

The driver thinking of me does not mind the jolt of his wagon,

The young mother and old mother comprehend me,

The girl and the wife rest the needle a moment and forget where they are,

They and all would resume what I have told them.

I have said that the soul is not more than the body,

And I have said that the body is not more than the soul,

And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one's self is,

And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own

funeral drest in his shroud,

And I or you pocketless of a dime may purchase the pick of the earth,

And to glance with an eye or show a bean in its pod confounds the

learning of all times,

And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it

may become a hero,

And there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheel'd universe,

And I say to any man or woman, Let your soul stand cool and composed

before a million universes.

And I say to mankind, Be not curious about God,

For I who am curious about each am not curious about God,

(No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God and

about death.)

I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least,

Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.

Why should I wish to see God better than this day?

I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then,

In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass,

I find letters from God dropt in the street, and every one is sign'd

by God's name,

And I leave them where they are, for I know that wheresoe'er I go,

Others will punctually come for ever and ever.

And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to

try to alarm me.

To his work without flinching the accoucheur comes,

I see the elder-hand pressing receiving supporting,

I recline by the sills of the exquisite flexible doors,

And mark the outlet, and mark the relief and escape.

And as to you Corpse I think you are good manure, but that does not

offend me,

I smell the white roses sweet-scented and growing,

I reach to the leafy lips, I reach to the polish'd breasts of melons.

And as to you Life I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths,

(No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.)

I hear you whispering there O stars of heaven,

O suns--O grass of graves--O perpetual transfers and promotions,

If you do not say any thing how can I say any thing?

Of the turbid pool that lies in the autumn forest,

Of the moon that descends the steeps of the soughing twilight,

Toss, sparkles of day and dusk--toss on the black stems that decay

in the muck,

Toss to the moaning gibberish of the dry limbs.

I ascend from the moon, I ascend from the night,

I perceive that the ghastly glimmer is noonday sunbeams reflected,

And debouch to the steady and central from the offspring great or small.

There is that in me--I do not know what it is--but I know it is in me.

Wrench'd and sweaty--calm and cool then my body becomes,

I sleep--I sleep long.

I do not know it--it is without name--it is a word unsaid,

It is not in any dictionary, utterance, symbol.

Something it swings on more than the earth I swing on,

To it the creation is the friend whose embracing awakes me.

Perhaps I might tell more. Outlines! I plead for my brothers and sisters.

Do you see O my brothers and sisters?

It is not chaos or death--it is form, union, plan--it is eternal

life--it is Happiness.

The past and present wilt--I have fill'd them, emptied them.

And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.

Listener up there! what have you to confide to me?

Look in my face while I snuff the sidle of evening,

(Talk honestly, no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer.)

Do I contradict myself?

Very well then I contradict myself,

(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

I concentrate toward them that are nigh, I wait on the door-slab.

Who has done his day's work? who will soonest be through with his supper?

Who wishes to walk with me?

Will you speak before I am gone? will you prove already too late?

The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab

and my loitering.

I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,

I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.

The last scud of day holds back for me,

It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow'd wilds,

It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.

I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,

I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,

If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.

You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,

But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,

And filter and fibre your blood.

Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,

Missing me one place search another,

I stop somewhere waiting for you.

Unlicensed Driver

2012-11-23T17:52:00.000-07:00

Where Manal Al-Sharif lives, must be a different world. Why would a 21st century government deny the right of a woman to drive? This is only one small example how Saudi places unthinkable restrictions on women. But the good news is that there are signs of reform"ation", the recent rights that Saudi women got to vote in municipal elections, or joining the local Shura councils are positive signs.

If one looks more closely, Saudi women are not the only ones getting discriminated. The men are too! Do Saudi men or women have any rights to elect their government? In a century where Arab Spring swept many parts of this region, Saudi Arabia remains to be as one of the most archaic and back dated nations, holding on the antiquated monarch system, denying the very basic civil rights to its citizens, women or men.

This Amnesty International press release from November 8 of 2012 reveals that there are protests in Saudi where no protests are allowed, officially, but the discontents that naturally arise when people are suppressed by various means of brutal tactics are taking place.

Read The Atlantic's tribute to Manal Al-Sharif: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/11/manal-al-sharif/309121/

I Say, Write - a Poem

2012-11-20T21:29:00.000-07:00

I Say, Write - a Poem

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

November 20, 2012

I say, write

Write like a man free of fear and guilt

Without temptations or reverence of greed

Your pen may dry up, papers torn

And the spherical light bulb may dim

Don’t give a hoot or care the monstrous critique

Keep putting words on that paper or digital screen

Glowing or rustling with seductive hiss

You may say what to write?

Anything you can think of is okay

Anything you can set eyes is quite good

Even the crawling spiders or distant wolves

Can bring out the desire of a scribe

To craft that story or a poem of love or despair

Perhaps the war torn and ravaged nation of faraway tongue

Or the snow fall in minus 20 degree Celsius and the hefty boot

Of a homeless shadow with a faded political slogan

Your words, paragraphs and even the punctuations

May outlive you, yes, for years to come

Your phrases, metaphors and subtle nuances

May inspire someone or no one, who cares!

Write like a manic dancer on a disco floor

Oblivious to all and nothing in cyber and real beat

In the end, we all return to dust, mighty or poor

Granular sized bones, even smaller than shredded paper

So, devour that well hidden Halloween chocolate treat

Wash away the restraint, trepidation and spoiled screed

I say, write
Write like a man free of fear and guilt

Charade - a Poem

2012-11-19T19:24:00.000-07:00

Charade - a Poem

By Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)

November 19, 2012

Don’t tell lies in verse

Or ruminate the joys

Of birds, flapping wings

Expanded over dawn

And sheer non sense

Can you count the stars

In a night of phosphorous sky?

Can you look at photos

Of agonies and cries

Over mangled bodies

Of babies wrapped

In eradicated flags?

You may choose to avert

Eyes and ears

Precious time of yours

Twaddle into the realm of

Fictitious equivalence

While the loopy siren

Screams the tune

Of a distorted farce

A Change is Gonna Come - Sam Cooke and Many Other Singers

2012-11-18T01:17:00.002-07:00

A beautiful song that the legendary singer Sam Cooke sang in 1963, "A Change is Gonna Come". Such a melodious and lyrical song!

Many other singers performed the cover of this unforgettable song. A few of these are collected below:

A Change is Gonna Come by Seal:

A Change is Gonna Come by Otis Redding

Here is Bob Dylan performing A Change is Gonna Come:

Aretha Franklin's tribute to Sam Cooke:

Tina Turner's cover of A Change is Gonna Come:

Patti Labelle performed A Change is Gonna Come in Nobel Peace Prize concert in 2004:

Aaron Neville's cover of A Change is Gonna Come:

Bettye Lavette and Jon Bon Jovi's duet performance of A Change is Gonna Come in 2008:

Billy Preston singing A Change is Gonna Come:

American alternative country singer Allison Moorer sang A Change is Gonne Come in 2011:

The 5th Dimension covered A Change is Gonna Come in 1970:

Leela James, an American R&B and soul singer performed A Change is Gonna Come:

American rock band Three Dog Night's performance of A Change is Gonna Come:

American singer Wayne Brady sang A Change is Gonna Come:

English alternative rock musician Billy Bragg performed A Change is Gonna Come:

Solomon Burke sang A Change is Gonna Come:

Terence Trent d Arby covered A Change is Gonna Come:

Gavin DeGraw performed A Change is Gonna Come:

Lauryn Hill covered A Change is Gonna Come with her band Fugees:

American indie rock band Cold War Kids performed A Change is Gonna Come:

The gospel singer Deitrick Haddon sang A Change is Gonna Come:

The British Rock singer Graham Parker performed A Change is Gonna Come:

Ska and rocksteady singer Prince Buster (Muhammed Yusef Ali) covered A Change is Gonna Come in a quite different rhythm and style:

Rock band's lead singer Morten Harket sang A Change is Gonna Come:

Canadian soul and R&B music group Jacksoul performed A Change is Gonna Come:

Ben Sollee, an American singer covered A Change is Gonna Come in uptempo with combination of cello and other background musical instruments, creating a different but catchy version of this unforgettable song:

Baby Huey, an American rock and soul singer sang A Change is Gonna Come, an excellent performance:

Michael Thompson and Bobby Womack performed A Change is Gonna Come:

The Righteous Brothers sang A Change is Gonna Come:

The Gits, an American punk rock band covered A Change is Gonna Come:

The Supremes sang A Change is Gonna Come:

The Manhattans, an American R&B band covers A Change is Gonna Come:

I Cry, Therefore I Am

2012-11-11T13:13:00.002-07:00

Read Michael Trimble's article in The New York Times, on tears and crying and the link to our very existence: "our brain evolved circuits to allow us to experience empathy and compassion, which in turn made civilization, and an ethics based on compassion, possible."

Link to article: I Cry, Therefore I am

Now, watch the video of tearful President Obama thanking his campaign staff after the 2012 election:

American Election 2012 - An Analysis

2012-11-07T23:54:00.002-07:00

I find American Presidential election is fascinating. From the start of the nomination process to the end of the concession and the winning speeches, the roller coaster ride that an average person may go through witnessing all dramas, cries and joys unfolding in television set or from internet stream, to me is simply irresistible. On November 6 after a long workday, I was glued to my television set and handheld computing device. The graphs and charts of states where vote results were coming from, the exit polls, varied punditry from CNN to Fox to CBS, NBC, ABC and of course Canadian CBC and British BBC, pouring over in coming results, analysis, disarrayed predictions, all these were shaping the evening to an exciting finale.

By the time Romney was giving his concession speech, my eyes were drooping with sleep. And when Obama was delivering the victory speech after winning the second term in a nail biting election, I was half asleep. That night I had a peaceful but dreamless sleep.

I knew Obama would win in the end. I am not a pollster, nor am I a highly paid political strategist. My self-assured confidence in Obama’s win was based on my observations of Americans, from close to far proximity in various time of my life.

Last four years the world economy had turbulence. Financial crisis gripped every parts of our globe. No one remained immune. Job loss was rampant. Consumer confidence took a nose dive to the south. Nonsensical wars and violence continued to rage. Thousands died or maimed for the reasons and belief beyond contemplation.

American debt reached its record high point. Budget deficits are in its widening tempo. People using food stamps and other charities soared. Governor Romney and President Obama both addressed these concerns in their speeches and heated debates, while the ordinary voters listened to their words, observed the pace of frantic campaigns and spiraling negative ads.

There will surely be plenty of analysis done on how Obama won and Romney lost. The following are my two cents:

· Despite all the negative epithets thrown at Obama, this President did accomplish more than the last fear mongering one:

o Ended the ill advised and costly war in Iraq

o Shifted attention and resources to Afghanistan where the need to resolve a war that has been raging for more than a decade grown but was neglected by the previous Bush administration for the reasons I never understood clearly.

o Decimated the extremists and violent groups like Al Qaeda and their ilk, not by spreading fear but by pin point accuracy targeting Laden and his cohorts and also embracing the friends in the troubling regions.

o Helped in flourishing “Arab Spring”, the ongoing revolution in a region, where one after another dictator is falling apart, and replaced by long sought after democracy. The road to democracy from brutal dictatorship has never been easy, but the moral and the tactical support provided by America to desperate people and allies are proving to be effective, and in the long run, have good potential bringing peace in this tragically unstable region.

o Took steps to correcting the dismal health care system in America. Though there are misconceptions remain about Obamacare, and there are fear mongers who would like to give it a bad name, but the very essence of humanity, caring for the sick and the vulnerable is the principle of this universal health care prototype.

o Helped the financial industries with pragmatic approach by bailouts where is needed, and regulations where warranted.

o Stopped the hemorrhaging job loss by economy boosting activities and support that have cut down unemployment rate and grew jobs by many millions in past two years.

o And above all, by presenting a vision of a more tolerant and diverse America than his opponent cared to embrace.

The second term for President Obama will not be easy. The challenges are many. The election results show a polarized nation. The red and the blue states in the electoral map, though seem colourful, but indicate toward a nation where perceptions of reality vary widely based on one’s political beliefs. However, behind all these distorted lenses through which ordinary people may perceive their world, the common yearning for peace and stability has the good probability bringing this culturally diversified nation in unity.

American election is indeed fascinating. In his victory speech, Obama’s soaring voice delivered a positive note: “Tonight, more than 200 years after a former colony won the right to determine its own destiny, the task of perfecting our union moves forward. It moves forward because of you. It moves forward because you reaffirmed the spirit that has triumphed over war and depression; the spirit that has lifted this country from the depths of despair to the great heights of hope -- the belief that while each of us will pursue our own individual dreams, we are an American family, and we rise or fall together, as one nation, and as one people”.

And as one people, united, everything can be achieved.