The poet of beauteous Bengal, the hunter of darkness, the poet of loneliness Jibananda Das (1899-1954) is the most romantic poet of twentieth century modern Bengali literature. He mingles myth and mystery in his evergreen poem ‘Banalata Sen’ where his weary soul takes refuge. The poet, an exhausted soul of worldly life, searches for peach and heavenly shelter for thousands of years on the earth and Banalata Sen of Nator,a country-land of the Bengal, blesses his soul with that blissfulness.
The poet-narrator is a weary soul who has been wandering towards the paths of the earth for thousands of years. He roams from the sea of Ceylon to the sea of Malaya, the gray land of the emperor Bimbisara and Asoka and too far city of Vidarbha. He is tired by life’s foamy ocean and gets a momentary bliss from her. As the poet says:
I, a weary soul, surrounded by life’s foamy ocean,
Was given a momentary bliss by Banalata Sen of Nator.
Her hair is like the ancient night of Vidisha, her face is like the charming carving of famous sculptor Sravasti. The poet is a rudderless mariner who loses his way in life’s foamy ocean and gets sanctuary in her nest like eyes. She gives the poet refuge as the rudderless, way-lost, hopeless mariner in the far-off ocean gets the hope of rescue at the sight of green grassy island. She has bird’s nest like eyes that absorb the weariness of the poet saying, “Where were you so long?”. It seems that she was also waiting with her thirsty heart for the poet. It is what the poet thirsts for; it is what a human being desires from his beloved. She is that one who can absorb the weariness of thousands of years, who can be the sanctuary of kestrel after the long sunny day.
All weariness turns into peace and harmony with the soft falling of evening. Then the kestrel wipes its sun-beam off its wings and takes rest in its nest. All colors of the earth melts into manuscript with the blinks of fireflies. All birds return to home, all rivers back to ocean, life’s all proceedings end and then remains nothing but darkness. This time the poet wants to sit facing his idolatry beloved.
Jibanananda Das is excellent in the use of images. ‘Nest like eyes’, ‘green grass land’, ‘foamy ocean’, ‘carving of Sravasti’, ‘rudderless crew’, ‘falling sound of dew’, ‘smell of sun’, ‘sparkle of fireflies’, ‘darkness’ all get life in this poem with the touch of his heart.
He compares the eyes of her with the ‘nest’ that is the peaceful shelter of the bird. ‘The green grass land’ indicates the hope of rescue. ‘The carving of Sravasti’ is the perfection of sculpture. The ‘falling sound of dew’, ‘sparkle’ of fireflies are blessing of love. Like the green grassy island in the eye of a lost mariner, the poet wants a sanctuary in the ‘nest like eyes’ of her who is his refuge in his ‘life’s foamy ocean’.
On the other hand ‘foamy ocean’, ‘rudderless crew’, ‘smell of sun’ all refer to weariness, tiredness, and hopelessness. Though darkness is the end of everything, the poet chooses darkness as the time to sit face to face with her. He says:
All birds return– all rivers– end life’s all proceedings
Remains only darkness, to sit facing Banalata Sen.
Darkness is the end of everything but dream. Why does the poet search in darkness and why does he want to sit before her in darkness? Does she remain in his dream? Does he search for his dream or self? Who knows, she may exist nowhere but in his dream or she might be the embodiment of his own self.
