away with this spilled milk...

I know, I know, my last entry had to do with poetry, but when I opened the newspaper this morning and saw this poem in the literature section, I couldn’t help myself but share it. Its called ROMANCE by Nuzhat Amin Mannan, who teaches English at Dhaka University.

For birthday got a hand bag, brand: fossil:
For anniversary it was a bottle of hot chili paste
What a pretty moon, I say
He asks where?
Who’d blame me
If I was now a spoil sport
Yearning for romance.

I hung around sulking
For old fashioned declarations
A handwritten avowal, a full-blown rose fragrant on my desk…
Something hidden, somewhere discreet
Less spicy, almost stark
But more fond for sure…priceless!

Men do not write any more, I gather
What a waste of time it would be
To serenade when a dinner for two
Peppered by his cell phone chimes
Is all that it takes!

I would have not minded at all
If he would have counted the many ways he loved me
Or if he lied all winter
Swore his love was infinite, to declare in
Spring his love for me had grown again some more*

But men are done being like John Donne:
They are our equals now
Neither worship the ground we walk on nor ask us
To for God’s sake hold our tongues.

Equal now,
Like blessed sweeteners
In the place of
Sweethearts!

*adapted from John Donne’s poem “Love’s Growth”

Now, though I’m not so much in love with the poem itself, I absolutely love that Donne has transcended language and culture to be as amazing here as he is back home. And one that note, I stumbled across a quote by Donne that I had never heard before and thought I would share it with you before I force myself to write something not directly related to poetry.

“Art is the most passionate orgy within a man’s grasp”.

Oh John Donne! I was born in the wrong century.