Apni ki adrsha markin nagarik hote chan (Do you want to be an ideal American Citizen?) is one of the most famous poems by distinguished Bengali poet Joydeb Basu. Read it in translation, and feel free to share your comments.
Do you want to be an ideal American Citizen? | Joydeb Basu
(translation © Kiriti Sengupta 2020)
They eat hamburgers,
have dwellings mortgaged.
They party as a pastime
on Saturdays and Sundays.
They loiter in the Disney
and blow up fascinations.
They love brute animals
but loathe black humans.
They use insurance
for health and education.
They find it necessary
for coffin or cremation.
With utmost dedication
they vote for both parties
who post armed forces in
Diego Garcia and Saudi.
Bush, Reagan, Bill,
or Madeleine Albright,
who led germ warfare
held weapons all to fight.
They drink insane:
coke or bourbon.
They swipe cards for pleasure.
On weekends, mow the lawn.
They are oblivious
to job security;
stick to the republic,
except for other countries.
They are steady taxpayers,
travel greyhound lines.
They hate even now
a war in domicile.
With utmost dedication
they vote for both parties:
who nurture carbides,
who claim the neem trees.
Who murder ruthlessly
in Bagdad, Libia, and Chile.
Who carry on with blockades,
and make children unhappy.
They pursue voting
in full cognizance.
They also join the Mass
every Sunday.
They go to the church, oh Holy!
What a terrible vainglory!
A poem with razor edged images, “Do you want to be an ideal American citizen?”, written by Joydeb Basu, is a striking portrait of the sinking dreamland, once looked at as the final destination of all aspiring young men in the world. The callous mindscape of the white that loathe the black humans, insanely running after pleasure, but murder ruthlessly them that stood against the nation, like Bagdad, Libia and Chile, ironically joining the Mass every Sunday (which I find untrue!), as a penance to their sins and to save their souls; but terribly vainglorious indeed.
Unfortunately, the mention of the War of Vietnam, C ambodia, and the Nuclear bombings of Hiroshima Nagasaki, missing in the narrative makes the poem a wee bit incomplete in my personal view.But as the choice of the linguistic and stylistic devices rests in the hands of the poet, the critical stand taken by me is of Reader Response, initiated by Stanley Fish, a century ago.
However, I enjoyed the linguistic lucidity and the easily understood substance depicted in the poem through the skilful translation by Kiriti Sengupta, the talented poet I love to read and follow even in these hard times.