AMINUR RAHMAN, The Unique Poet Searching for True Love

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DATO’ DR. AHMAD KAMAL ABDULLAH, Malaysia National Laureate

25 Jan 2016

One of the poets who participated in the World Poetry Reading in Kuala Lumpur in 2004 was Aminur Rahman (born 1966) from Bangladesh. He is a man of sturdy, built smiles easily, welcoming and friendly with other poet friends. His poetry theme was significantly related to the whispers of love between lovers, the rustle and shiver of nature, and the quest to find the meaning of true love.

Do these verify Aminur as a romantic-idealist poet? Poet Fazal Shahabuddin and Poet Aminur Rahman have done a lot of poetry activities together from 1985 to 2013. Spring Festival of Poetry, published Kabikantha Poetry Magazine both really created a huge sensation in Bangladesh poetry arena.

According to Jaafa Hs, a poet from Malaysia, poetry has become a major focus in Bangladesh and the people would be very pleased if we are familiar with Tagore and Gitanjali.
The love of Bangladeshis towards the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore cannot be denied when I and Dato’ A. Samad Said were exclusively invited by the Kathak Literature Association in 2007 to launch our poetry books in Bangla that was translated by Aminur Rahman.

Within the five day affair, the response towards our poetry was spectacular. Due to the absence of A. Samad Said, I was given coverage by the major medias in Dhaka. I was interviewed and was requested to recite poetry. I was celebrated by the most known Bangladesh poets such as Al-Mahmud, Al-Mujaheedy and more. The Malaysia High Commissioner in Bangladesh was also invited.

In the record stores, one can hear CDs being played; songs based on the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore on love, nature, humanity and the divine lingers on. Thus, when do the contemporary poets of Bangladesh can separate themselves from the colossal poetry tradition of Tagore? Impossible, Love and Love, nature and divinity grows and lives in their personality and self-identity. The Benggali language is a substantial, notable language and because of that fact, Rabindranath Tagore was named as the Nobel Prize winner.

Every February every year for one whole month, the President, the leaders, ministers, professors, authors and poets, young people, and the whole country celebrates the victory of the Bengali language as the national language of their sovereign nation. In February 1952, they fought to stand for their mother tongue when it was planned to bechanged to Urdu. They refused and werewilling to shed blood, thousands fell in the revolution. That was the answer on why the art of poetry of Rabindranath Tagore stay strong in the Bengali nation.

Since getting to know the Malaysian poet, Aminur Rahman has not missed the opportunity to enforce their friendship. Furthermore, his profession as a pharmacist enables him to travel to Malaysia at least once a year. If not to Kuala Lumpur, he will journey to his office in Langkawi. Does poetry not interfere with his profession? Definitely, there is somewhat a conflict as he is not only a talented poet; he is also an artist inclining towards expressionism. Hence, his passions in the arts are used to analyze the art of painting, poetry, and theater.

His profession as a pharmacist seems to deny the contradiction of the scientific world with the world of emotion and poetry. It is proven; science and arts can become one. Science alone perhaps make human robot like without thoughts, feelings, and love. With science and art in harmony, a new strength awakens. The poetry tradition of love, nature, and divinity are definitely a legacy of Rabindranath Tagore. Rabindranath Tagore’s poetry root is the Benggali language. Was he not the poet who won the 1923 Nobel Prize with his majestic poems of Gitanjali? Thus, Benggali has proven that its prince has become the monumental force to ensure the endurance of the language. Gitanjali was written in English by Tagore and foreword by Yeats and recommended as a nominee for the Nobel Prize.

Aminur has participated in many poet festivals in the world including Struga, Colombia, Nicaragua, Spain, in Alma Atta, in Mongolia, and Malaysia. He has won awards and gold medals. His talent recognized and appreciated. Being in his position within the Bangladesh poetry map, Aminur Rahman is the younger generation to eminent Bangladeshi poets in his time such as Shamsur Rahman (1932), Al Mahmud (1936), Fazal Shahabuddin (1936), Hayat Saif (1942), Asad Chowdhury (1943), Nirmalendu Goon (1945) and Mohammad Nurul Huda (1949) to name a few close to him. Rabindranath Tagore wrote:

A hundred years from now
Who could you be
Reading my poem curiously
A hundred years from now!
(Fakrul Alam, 188)

As I listen to that old-time song of pain and personal love –
The old tale of meeting and parting –
And as I gaze into the infinite past,
At last through the darkness of Time appears your form like the pole-star With memeroies eternally laden.
(translated. Bose in Fakrul Alam, 167)

Shamsur Rahman seemed to be lost, compassionless; poetry of love was non-existence after the passing of Rabindranath Tagore:

People say poetry has fallen on hard times in Bangladesh
In particular, since you died the muse herself has lost
All loveliness and grace. Only ruggedness and obscurity
Surround it now. All around it one sees wastelands.
(Fakrul Alam, 37)

Hayat Saif as well brought the theme of love as an inheritance from Rabindranath Tagore which seemed to be more distinguished in Aminur Rahman. Hayat wrote:

How could I know?
You never called my name,
Love keeps burning
An eternal flame.
Never have you loved
So how may you see?
All through this life
I kept losing me.
Life moves in circles
Hatred, love, hope and fear
What awaits is unknown
So ends a light-year.
(Hayat Saif 2001:46)

Aminur Rahman drives the vehicle of aesthetics and poetics with conviction as Perpetual Diary was born from the collision of the meaning of true love, his whole body and soul combines with the essence of what he believes in. Love and Love is his breath of life. After the passing of Rabindranath Tagore, he still embraced the theme dearly. He is not pessimistic as Shamsur Rahman who is worried and in doubt that the poetry of love was dying as the ‘prophet’ has gone. ‘This is me, Aminur Rahman, digging the meaning that you doubt; I am here the finder of true love.’ The nature around you, the science and the arts, the silent poet, women as source of inspiration, honesty and lies, loyalty of love or deception, envy that kills the intimacy and desire, broken passion, a song that hides in a cave without a name. Where is the love harmony? Nature that brings the rustle of breeze, the melancholic song, the thunder and lightning assaulting earth, the invisible that suddenly appear, where is the face with the line of wound? Where is the chest with theripped lines from the lashes of the jagged whip? Love is daunting. If we disregard it, love will chew and tear us apart. It will leave you limp on the silent floor. There, inspiration will greet you. The poetry of love will welcome you. The valid meaning of love will magnificently appear before you.

You are facing a mysterious woman; your strength dissipates. Thus you are looking for new synergy, wretchedly rowing your boat in the middle of the night, the song of sorrow in the small morning hours, the flute of the traveler suddenly loses it melody. Is this the love that was strangled in the arrogant heart? This is what Aminur Rahman try to feel and sense. This is what he experienced in real life and in his hallucination, illusion and reality, dogma enfold the soul, the poet asking for a sip of honey to set him free. Poetry of love seeks to be created. ‘I shall create you to be a witness for my generation’, whispers Aminur Rahman. True, Tagore has gone but Aminur the pharmacist has found a science beaker in the chalice of poem. Aminur has found the color purple or turquoise. He folded his canvas of poetry. Hence, the poetry of love is embraced by doubts and uncertainty, are you Cleopatra or Mariam? Are you A’isyah or Madhubala? Is the roadfar to Mecca and Madinah? I evaluate word by word, I seduce phrase by phrase, in the light of day camethe whispers and murmurs, in the dusk lay a sufi looking for God. Between treachery and loyalty, between the faith of an alkahfi youth and the evil devil that has tempted Eve, throwing Adam unto Earth. Did Adam and Eve burnt the virtuous love of God. In the House of Love, in Perpetual Diary, is it true that love was killed?

This is the way I walk, talk
Live, and sometime even die,
Nobody knows that, nobody understands.
Does the river understand, or the sky?
Does the sky understand?
Does the flower understand?
(Confusion, Perpetual, 28)
I don’t have any words to send you
Only my feeling is present
How can I explain to you
This is my soul, my existence!
(My Soul, Perpetual, 48)

Finding meaning in the self and true love is not as easy as expected – what more if the search is not based on an existence that has no relation with the Creator. Does the doubt that arises from one’s ignorance and uncertainty, and the savage passion of Eve now resulted in our inheritance of life that is full of magnetism. Life that is difficult to comprehend unless for those with insight and faith. As the journey of Aminur still throbbing in this realm, his love and pulse will still search for the meaning of true love in his true meaning as a poet. Perpetual Diary is his leagacy from his time and history; because he is a poet, and thus God looks upon him, not only Rabindranath Tagore.

 

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AMINUR RAHMAN Penyair Unik Mencari Erti Cinta Sejati

DATO’ DR. AHMAD KAMAL ABDULLAH

Sasterawan Negara Malaysia

25 Januari 2016

SALAH seorang penyair yang menjadi peserta Pengucapan Puisi Dunia Kuala Lumpur pada tahun 2004 adalah Aminur Rahman (lahir 1966) dari Bangladesh. Dia bertubuh kukuh dan gempal dan mudah tersenyum dan cepat ramah dengan kenalan penyair yang lain. Tema puisinya sarat membawa bisikan cinta antara kekasih, bisikan dan getaran kepada alam, dan pertanyaan-pertanyaan untuk mencari makna cinta sejati.

Apakah ini gambaran sah bahawa Aminur seorang penyair yang romantik-idealis? Dia penyair generasi baharu Bangladesh yang aktif membantu Fazal Shahabuddin, penyair mapan dalam festival Kabikantha yang menerbitkan Majalah Puisi Kabikantha.

Menurut penyair Jaafa Hs yang hadir dari Malaysia, puisi menjadi tumpuan utama di Bangladesh dan mereka senang sekali sekiranya kita ikut mengenal Tagore dan Gitanjalinya.

Kesan kecintaan rakyat Bangladesh terhadap puisi Rabindranath Tagore tak dapat saya singkirkan apabila saya dan Dato’ A. Samad Said diundang khas oleh Persatuan Kesusasteraaan Kathak pada 2007 bagi pelancaran buku puisi kami dalam bahasa Bangladesh diterjemahkan oleh Aminur Rahman.

Dalam tempoh lima hari sambutan terhadap puisi kami sungguh mempesonakan. Oleh sebab A. Samad Said tidak dapat hadir, saya diberikan liputan di media-media utama di Dhaka, ditemuramah dan membaca puisi dan diraikan oleh sasterawan terkemuka Bangladesh seperti al-Mahmud, al-Mujahidee dan lain-lain. Ikut hadir ialah Pesuruhjaya Tinggi Malaysia di Bangladesh.

Di kedai-kedai rekod, anda boleh mendengar cakra padat dimainkan berdasarkan lagu-lagu puisi Rabindranath Tagore tentang cinta, alam, kemanusiaan dan ketuhanan. Jadi, bilakah masanya para penyair kontemporari Bangladesh boleh mengasingkan dirinya daripada tradisi besar kepenyairan Tagore? Tak mungkin, Cinta dan Cinta, alam dan Ketuhanan tidak meresap tumbuh dalam sahsiah dan jati dirinya. Bahasa Benggali, adalah bahasa besar dan agung justeru, Rabindranath Tagore dinobatkan sebagai pemenang Hadiah Nobel.

Pada bulan Februari setiap tahun sepanjang satu bulan penuh Presiden, pembesar, para menteri dan para profesor dan sasterawan, para pemuda dan rakyat jelata meraikan kemenangan bahasa Benggali yang menjadi bahasa kebangsaan negara mereka. Pada 21 Februari 1952, mereka berjuang mempertahankan bahasa ibunda mereka yang ingin ditukarkan kepada bahasa Urdu. Mereka menolak dan sanggup bertumpahan darah, ribuan yang terkorban dalam revolusi. Itulah jawapannya bahasa pengucapan seni puitis Rabindranath Tagore kekal utuh di negara Benggali itu.

Semenjak perkenalan pertamanya dengan penyair Malaysia, dia tidak melepaskan peluang untuk mengakrabkan persahabatannya. Apa lagi rangka tugasnya sebagai ahli farmasi membolehkannya bergerak ke Malaysia sekurang-kurangnya sekali setahun. Jika tidak di Kuala Lumpur, nescaya dia ke pejabatnya di Langkawi. Tidakkah puisi menjadi gangguan kepada profesinya itu? Tentulah berbelah bahagi. Dia bukan saja berbakat sebagai penyair, tetapi juga cinta kepada seni lukis terutamanya kepada modern art dalam aliran ekspresionisme. Justeru, minatnya yang berakar kepada seni itu dijuakkannya kepada menganalisis pelbagai cabang seni yang lain: seni lukis, puisi dan teater.

Profesinya sebagai seorang ahli farmasi seolah-olah menolak kontradiksi dunia sains dengan dunia emosi dan cinta penyair. Sains dan Seni bisa bersatu. Sains melulu mungkin boleh menjadikan insan sebagai robot tanpa fikir, rasa dan cinta. Dengan harmoninya sains dan seni maka akan bangkitlah sebuah kekuatan yang baharu: Tradisi puisi-puisi cinta, alam dan ketuhanan memang diwarisinya daripada khazanah Rabindranath Tagore. Akar puisinya daripada pujangga besar Rabindranath Tagore yang menulis dalam bahasa Benggali.

Bukankah pujangga besar ini yang memenangi Anugerah Nobel (1923) dengan puisi besarnya Gitanjali. Benggali telah membuktikan seorang puteranya menjadi agung bagi melestarikan bahasa ibundanya. Rabindranath Tagore menterjemahkan sendiri dalam bahasa Inggeris dan Yeats, menulis pengantar dan merekomendasikan Gitanjali untuk menjadi calon pemenang Hadiah Nobel.

Posisinya dalam peta puisi Bangladesh, Aminur Rahman dari generasi baharu selepas penyair besar sezaman Bangladesh yang pernah ditemuinya seperti Fazal Sahabuddin (1936), Shamsur Rahman (1936), Hayat Saif (1942), Asad Chowdhury (1943), Nirmalendu Goon (1945), Abdul Hasan, Mohammad Nurul Huda (1949) untuk menyebut beberapa orang yang rapat dengannya. Rabindranath Tagore menulis:

A hundred years from now

Who could you be

Reading my poem curiously

A hundred years from now!

(terj. Fakrul Alam, 188)

As I listen to that old-time song of pain and personal love –

The old tale of meeting and parting –

And as I gaze into the infinite past,

At last through the darkness of Time appears your form like the pole-star
With memories eternally laden.

(terj. Bose dlm. Fakrul Alam, 167)

People say poetry has fallen on hard times in Bangladesh

In particular, since you died the muse herself has lost

All loveliness and grace. Only ruggedness and obscurity

Surround it now. All around it one sees wastelands.
(Fakrul Alam, 37)

Hayat Saif juga membawa tema cinta seperti yang diwarisinya daripada Rabindranath Tagore yang kelihatan kian hebat dalam diri Aminur Rahman, Hayat menulis:

How could I know?
You never called my name,

Love keeps burning
An eternal flame.
Never have you loved
So how may you see?
All through this life
I kept losing me.
Life moves in circles
Hatred, love, hope and fear

What awaits is unknown
So ends a light-year.
(Hayat Saif 2001:46)

Aminur Rahman memandu kenderaan estetika dan puitika yang diyakini apabila Perpetual Diary dilahirkan dengan penemuannya dengan makna cinta yang sejati, seluruh jiwa raganya mengadun bumbu yang dihayatinya. Cinta dan Cinta adalah nafas hidupnya kini. Selepas Rabindranath Tagore pergi, dia masih mendakap erat tema tersebut. Dia tidak pesimistik seperti Shamsur Rahman bimbang dan ragu bahawa puisi cinta yang sekerat kerana “nabi”nya Tagore sudah pergi. “Ini aku Aminur Rahman, menggali makna yang kamu ragui, aku di sini pencari cinta yang sejati.” Alam di sekitarmu, ilmu sains dan seni dan sastera, sasterawan yang sepi, gundah yang berkelana, wanita yang menjadi sumber inspirasi, kejujuran atau kepalsuan, cinta yang setia atau cinta yang palsu, cemburu yang menjadi pembunuh rasa dan mesra, ghairah yang patah, senandung yang bersembunyi di gua yang tak bernama. Di manakah harmoni cinta itu? Alam yang membawa desir pawana, lagu yang melankolik, guruh, kilat petir menerjah bumi, si halimunan yang tiba-tiba muncul, di mana wajahnya yang bergaris luka? Di mana bilur dadanya dilibas cemeti pari yang bergerigis? Cinta itu dahsyat. Jika kita alpa Cinta akan mengunyah dan mengoyakkan kita. Tinggallah kau terjerembap di lantai sepi. Dan di situ mula inspirasi menyapamu. Puisi Cinta akan meramahimu. Makna sahih cinta menjelma indah.

Kau mendepani perempuan dengan misteri, lelakimu yang hilang energi, lalu dicari sinergi baharu, setengah sengsara mengayuh perahu di tengah malam, lagu dinihari yang pilu, seruling musafir yang tiba-tiba hilang melodi. Apakah ini cinta yang tersangkut di sukma angkuh? Inilah yang cuba dihayati oleh Aminur Rahman. Ini dialaminya secara real dan secara halusinasi. Ilusi dan realiti, dogma memaut sukma, penyair mohon seteguk madu kebebasan. Puisi cinta mahu lahir, akan kulahirkan bagi kesaksian zamanku, bisik Aminur Rahman. Benar Tagore sudah pergi namun Aminur yang pharmasis menemukan beaker sains dalam piala puisi. Aminur menemukan warna ungu atau firus. Dia melipat kanvas pusinya. Maka puisi Cinta dipaut prasangka dan curiga, apakah kau Cleopatra atau Mariam? Apakah kau A’isyah atau Madhubala? Jauhkah jalan ke Mekah dan ke Madinah? Aku menilai kata demi kata, aku menggurat frasa demi frasa, di siang bolong datang bisik dan igau, di senja lembayung tertiarap seorang sufi yang mencari Tuhan. Antara durja dan setia, antara iman pemuda al-kahfi dan kesyaitanan iblis menipu Hawa, Adam terlontar ke dunia. Apakah Adam dan Hawa terbakar cinta syahdu Tuhan. Dan dalam Rumah Cinta, dalam Perpetual Diary ini benarkah Cinta sudah terbunuh?

This is the way I walk, talk
Live, and sometime even die,
Nobody knows that, nobody understands.
Does the river understand, or the sky?
Does the sky understand?
Does the flower understand?
(Confusion, Perpetual.. 28)

I don’t have any words to send you
Only my feeling is present
How can I explain to you
This is my soul, my existence!
(My Soul, Perpetual, 48)

Mencari makna diri dan cinta sejati tak semudah yang dijangka –apalagi jika pencarian itu tak didasarkan kepada kewujudan yang ada hubungannya dengan Sang Pencipta Yang Esa. Apakah keraguan yang timbul bermula dari kealpaan dan keraguan seorang Adam dan nafsu buas sang Hawa, maka kita mewarisinya. Kehidupan yang penuh dengan magisme yang sulit diraba oleh insan kecuali dengan rasa dan firasat dan iman. Oleh sebab perjalanan Aminur masih berdenyut di alam maya ini, maka cinta dan getaran nadinya akan terus mencari makna cinta sejati dalam kesejatian makna kepenyairannya. Perpetual Diary adalah warisannya dari masa dan sejarahnya. Kerana dia penyair, maka Tuhan merenunginya bukan hanya Rabindranath Tagore.