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Seeking Bonolata

The call (or not meant to call) from N triggered a lot of old memories and not in any particular order. Most are actually not even associated with her. She represents a place and time in my life long gone. Yet there are threads that remain and can be tugged even by such accident as that call. Such is the power of those faded, long ago days. It got me thinking about the time I had heard Soumitra Chatterjee live reciting poetry and specifically Bonolata Sen. That was not the first time I had heard the poem recited but certainly was the version that etched the deepest impression. The words came alive in a way they had not ever before. Then fast forward to my marriage. 

Most of my cousins sat out of it for reasons I am not entirely sure of but then I always lacked the social intelligence to thrive in Indian families. That was an arranged marriage and everything about it would have checked off the requisite boxes of acceptable. Yet it was met with a seething disapproval which would come to a rolling boil when I decided to leave him after only a couple of years of being married, tiny little  J in tow. During those couple of years, I had a deep immersion into Bengali culture. Given I did not read Bangla fluently, my ex read books to me routinely. Jibananda Das was one of his favorite poets and so I must have heard all of his poems more than once - Bonolata Sen included. N unsettled things that have been at rest for a very long time and while it was aggravating in the moment, that brought clarity too.

It was not quite the Soumitra Chatterjee recitation experience but there was something special about it because it allowed me to wrap my hopes, dreams and aspirations for my life around his rendition of that poem. Things come to be imbued with meaning they were not meant to have. There is that last remaining thread that ties fragments of my life together - that is N. Childhood, youth and adulthood. She was there through all of it, had known things that could have altered the course of my life but she chose to stay away and absent. There is nothing to tie N to where I am now and those who complete my world and it's best to leave it that way. 

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