Nadeem Rahmans
Politically Incorrect Poems
By Raana Haider
In light of the current global volatile economic, political and social scenario, the contents of Nadeem Rahmans compilation read relevant.
Published more than a decade earlier, two landmark events in 2016 have set new parameters. Marking the United Kingdoms decision to Brexit the European Union and the occupancy of the White House by the 45th President of the Divided States of America (the incisive caption captured by Time magazine in its choice of Donald Trump as its 2016 Man of the Year award); again and again, the reading of Rahmans poems appear surprisingly politically correct. I suspect much to the poets chagrin.
Some excerpts from Nadeem Rahmans poems:
True Brits
There will always be an England
And a European Union, that contrives
To give the English, the benefit of everything
They traditionally despise:
There will always be an England
Of extraordinary species
And oddballs and misfits
We proudly call true Brits.
Pax America
A prose poem
America is many hearts divided, a dichotomy of dreams, of fierce patriotism and still fiercer individualism, of unity in secular diversity and centrifugal forces.
Nadeem Rahman in a Post Script writes: This piece was written well before September 11, 2001 and although one can never write too much about America, the land where truth is stranger than fiction, 9/11 was more surreal than the most far fetched premonitions
American Cliches
There are two Americas, in everything
And I would sing, God bless America
If I knew, which of the two was the real thing,
For Post-war Baby Boomers/todays Senior Citizens, here is a stroll down memory lane. Those were the days my friend, that we thought would never end. Conscious connectivity and associative experiences accompany the reader. Here we have poetic throwbacks to historical credos, events and figures. For todays Millennial generation, Politically Incorrect Poems may present zero connectivity and vague references to ancient history.
Comrades
Communism,
What a perfect dream
And how perfectly
Impossible.
Cold War
I must confess, I miss the Cold War
It was less confusing then
When I knew for sure, who
Was the arch villain and.
For history buffs, the poet brings accusations and lamentations, wit and grit to:
The Saga of the Raj
For a race
Of voracious shopkeepers,
Whose instincts never failed
Their bulldog breed,
India was indeed
Historys most celebrated
Treasure chest, pillaged
Through the ages.
And the opulence
Of any native nobleman
Far outshone the crown jewels
Of some merchant
Prince of thieves.
Calcutta
He should have been buried here
Who else, but Karl Marx
The archetype Calcatian
And architect of chaos,
Since Calcutta
Is the living ethos
Of Marxist salvation,
Through municipal inertia
And proletarian contention,
His disciples alone can atone, for this
City of paradox.
(The Communist Party of India (Marxist) governed Calcutta from 1977 to 2011).
Furthermore, Nadeem Rahman takes on our political leaders and todays society:
Our Gurus
.
There is no cause for despair,
Our martyrs have not failed
Nor lived in vain, even in the heat
Of fifty years of freedom
We have fathered anew elite,
Of equally outrageous haramzadas
And now, new gurus prevail!
Our Society
....
Our society is one of superlatives, replete
With PhDs and demonic intellectuality,
Whose verbosity alone would atone
For endemic poverty, but unfortunately
In Bangladesh, money flows
Against the force of gravity
And neither donor nor NGO
Have a clue, as to who
Is the end user, of
Their philanthropy.
One of his last poems is ascribed to the Lord and arriving at the end of the book, one is left pondering: is not the poet observing and questioning the absurd, maybe risky yet obvious - for us to ruminate over? Do we not need to ponder over and question what is deemed to be politically incorrect?
I Wonder If The Lord
I wonder if the Lord, is supremely bored
With all the theological thunder
That He must endure
From dawn to dusk,
From every synagogue
And mosque
How does He survive
Our prayers five, the bell
The book and candle and all
The Papal scandal?....
A cautionary note on typographical errors. For example, page (19) modem for modern; (57) whimps for wimps; (83) dieing for dying; (91) Pursianfor Persian; (106) form for from; (111) bullishit for bullshit; (137) modem for modern and Presidnet for President; (141) mussel for muscle; (144) latter for later.
Acerbic, brazen, caustic, devil-may-care..zestful encapsulates the tone of the verses composed by Nadeem Rahman in Politically Incorrect Poems (Academic Press Publishers Library Dhaka, 2004). It remains a page-turner.n
