Two Poems and a War

Two Poems and a War

Feelings towards the war on Iraq.

The attack (not war) on Iraq reminded me many things but most interestingly two poems by Sukumar Roy. Readers may be acquainted with the brilliant poems and cartoons of this exceptional writer. He was the best in his extraordinary way in the history of Bangla literature. The first poem came to my mind is famous “Bapu Ram Sapure”. I had read this poem about snakes early in my childhood. Frankly speaking, I failed completely to understand the meaning. It seemed to me at that point a fearsome poem about frightening snakes. After some years, when I was a high school student, I came across the poem once again. This time I could grasp the irony and satire of this poem. I had burst into laughter. The poem was about a boy who wanted a snake from a snake charmer. But he put forward some conditions regarding the behavior of the snake. The snake should not have any teeth, should not possess any destructive characteristics, should not have anger, should not make any frightening sound or gesture, should be very gentle, should be harmless. The boy at the last paragraph of the poem disclosed the reasons to the snake charmer for wanting such snake. He wanted to make the snake quite once and for all, by beating it mercilessly.

I am wondering for last few days, how the poet could visualize the behavior of USA against Iraq. USA clearly wanted to capture Iraq with her valuable oil, under the newfound rhetoric of “regime change”. For last twelve years, they had divided Iraq by creating “no fly zones”. Monitored all the government activity under UN supervision. They maintained continuous bombardment over any suspicious target. Weapon inspectors did whatever needed to satisfy the USA and allies to destroy any military capabilities they had. The Iraqi nation was suffering under sanctions. Millions of innocent children died for lack of food and medicine. They are a nation under seize, ill feed and ill clad. In the last days before war they cooperated with UN inspectors at every possible way to avert an attack. They followed all the UN orders. They are weak as ever, humble as ever. They were compromising for the shake of survival. When all was done for a peaceful solution, the USA disclosed their real intention. They wanted to crush a weaker nation under their superior military capabilities. They are adamant to topple the Iraqi government. They were correctly assuring their people that the objective of conquering Iraq would not take much time. Victory will be achieved in shortest possible time. Do you find similarity and understand the satire of poem now?

Now I shall go the next poem. It is also written by Sukumar Roy. The title is “Bhoy Peona”, the meaning could be “Don’t be afraid”. In this poem a monster was standing before some very weak and frightened creatures. The monster was holding a club behind his back and was inviting the weak creatures to pay a visit to his cave. He was assuring them that he was weak and cannot fight with them and his wife and children were waiting eagerly for them inside the cave. The weak and innocent creatures were afraid to death. They were very sure about the monster’s ill intentions. They knew that they had no chance of survival if they cannot escape. They also knew that once the monster grabs them, they would become food for the monster family. The monster was using all kinds of rhetoric to encourage them to enter into his cave. But the weak creatures were trying to go away. At last when the innocent and weaker creatures refused to enter the cave, the monster got very angry. He threatened them to crush them with his mighty club if they did not accept his orders of entering into his cave peacefully to become food for his family.

It is indeed surprising how the poet could describe the evil designs of the powerful nations to subdue weaker nations to fulfill their desired. In the present conflict, USA used the UN, the UN Security Council, and the weapons inspectors to disarm the Iraqi government. They used the oil for food program to make profit. The forced Iraqi government to disclosed all the official secrets regarding arms and military capabilities. They hijacked the report even before it went to the Security Council. They utilized all the means of deception to find out the weaknesses of Iraq. When all was done USA declared unanimously that no matter what was the world opinion, they would strike Iraq and change the government. Surely the same game of “monster and weaker” in the poem was played again. Their act had violated all the international rules and regulations. It was noticeable that USA was instantly vocal about “Geneva Convention”, when few of their soldiers were caught, but many people can recall their defiance of such convention when they dealt with the people Afghanistan. People around the world will also question about what regulation they had followed when they attacked Iraq. Surely the monster game! The monster will do whatever it takes to fulfill its objectives. It is time for the third world countries to understand the rhetoric of these monsters. Otherwise, when they will show their real nature, there would be no defense.

We can only pray, the nightmare will come to an end as soon as possible and the innocent Iraqi people will find a path of freedom and sovereignty.