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justice is .
The first lesson we are taught about life
has something to do with dharma and karma.
“Dharma”. “Karma” two good appetizing
and rhyming words they may come in handy for classic poets.
Dharma they say is indefinable,
it is all encompassing
and yet untranslatable.
Dharma they say means
Justice, Integrity, Veracity,
Righteousness and Legitimacy.
Almost enough meaning for a word.
And you carry it on with yourself.
Dharma makes a versatile lucky-charm.
All your life, you blame things you don’t understand
on the word no one has ever understood.
Sometimes highly frustrated with the cruelty
and apathy of everything, you even resort to blaming karma
and you begin to trace past lives, ancestry
you bother about the enormity of trivialities
you start worrying about the petty lineage of everything
you happen to come across.
this insanity deludes you as you fret and fume over
descent—pedigree—wretched caste—and above all proper
marriages and the legitimate sons
and then it all comes to you
the truth, the truth about all this ****
the truth about Dharma
You remember the man,
the man Dharma,
for—the medium is the message.
You realize he is a bastard,
an illegitimate son.
Justice is Dharma.
Dharma is a bastard.
So you know Justice is. . .
Well, whatever. But still, blotted.
Blemished. And with Scandal for a middle name.
Perhaps all your hopes die and you stop all your expectations.
Or, perhaps you suddenly throw back you head
and laugh and laugh. . .
Whatever you chose to do
the truth hits you
when she whispers
‘Legitimacy is Illegitimate.’
| sad |
Deciphering a culture
INSTRUCTION #1 NAILED TO THE WALL: SWITCH OFF YOUR CELLPHONES
Keep Smiling! This is what I got to read on ink-splattered desks one lonely day in the central Winners DON’T library of the IIT Madras. I was there waiting for someone to come and join me Frustrated and all the books surrounding me were such rigorous affairs in quantum mechanics One and ocean engineering and acoustics Sided and though I had studied science at school, I had opted out of academics Lovers for (shall we say) personal reasons.
And so there was literally nothing Association in there that I could read and understand, so I set about staring at the desks (Frustrated One Sided Lovers Association) and suddenly the graffiti made sense (Acronym FOSLA) and my reading picked up Join FOSLA da! in leaps and FOSLA: Exclusively for mother-fuckers like you bounds. Watching it was so funny I liked the picture. . . because I imagined Life begins at 40, Ice cream expires at 2 nothing in these mass of Bare! Scientific and Technical books with their !!SUPERB!! mumbo-jumbo jargons could attract me Lol! but these words I love rumour penned by different students was kind of distracting My kiss is bad and also a nice thing to My head is sad engage myself Its your love in.
So That’s made me glad I was busy straining to Help everyone! Love everyone! And yes, HATE ALL!! make out the CAT words and some of it was boring Guru is great! and Love my ass, don’t you? racy and Simran hip and Impossible breasts had self-explanatory illustrations Don’t marry be happy of naked, naked women that Asha, I love you was really Come out of the web of the world disgusting and horrific and If God has given you a rock it’s your choice to build a bridge or a wall I really didn’t know what to say I have built a wall, what you want to do for that????? and Then I will curse Him and go search for some grub (only a rock, eh!) i looked up in exasperation.
INSTRUCTION #2 NAILED TO THE WALL: DON’T REPLACE BOOKS TO STACK. LEAVE THEM ON THE TABLE.
The other words Me too are silly Me too da idiot and I try my best to take How dare you everything Om Namah Shivaiah of this civilization Morals R for Morons by just To suck the marrow of life! (not me fuckers, but Henry DAVID Thoreau) deciphering Structure of Benzyne a Boobsy culture Keep Trying but Illustration (India map) its all Point out Lovegadh? Sexpura? in vain. Quates Desk ww.hornybanana.com So what I love vaginas sunflower gulmohar Oh god help me!! When I start talking to a girl, she starts loving me. Its disgraceful. Help me! Is it your bra? Nice work Illustration Can you draw the equation of the above ellipse Take your origin as Shravati and +ve axis along Sarayu u r time starts now No cunt if you take Shrav and Sarayu as lost what will be your origin Fat Fool Dribbler, read that AGAIN. Got me? Hum angrejon ke jamane ke fuckers hain Rock n Roll Stupid Once upon a time. . . there was Anushya. . . No smoking U taste good! Hippy sex? Wanna something hot?
And I was feeling blank and looking up and repeating Wanna something hot?
INSTRUCTION #3 NAILED TO THE WALL: SILENCE.
| sad |
The Gods wake up
Another worst things with the Gods is that
They sleep most of the time—
(they don’t even dream).
If you happen to go near heaven:
It is a very noisy boring place.
And all that you get to hear there are—
Thirty three million synchronized godly snores.
(The Goddesses snore too).
The Gods sleep right through the prayers
Performed by the Brahmins—
(maybe they find it boring).
Births, Marriages, innumerable yagnas,
Brahmins take the center-stage, all the
Gods skip. Also, “Om” is now obsolete—
a kind of recurring mosquito buzz.
(Besides, Om is ©opyrighted).
At times, the sleeping celestials do stir.
Gods always get excited over funerals—
(they are kind of necrophilic).
The loud drums lead the dead to eternal sleep,
Ancient noises herald the escaping life.
This deeper music shakes the skies.
That’s when the Gods wake up.
(Just to receive the dead.)
| joy |
Inheritance
Helplessly, silent;
we watched it being seized away, all our lands.
The Government—a fulltime bewitching whore
had promised Jobs. Industrialization. Power, Electric.
Everything went, Nothing came.
Now, landless, uprooted,
unsettled in a resettlement colony
we feast our souls on lucent memories—Of an earlier life.
When memory charts
familiar horizons
I often recollect that
long ago rainy Sunday
in our crowded church,
Fr. Jose reading crisply
“Blessed are the meek
for they shall inherit the earth.”
| sad |
Elegy to my first keyboard
You entered my life when I was twelve. I really didn’t
have hormones then. I was lost in a different world. Of
science, of space, and the small small atoms that we were
all made up of. I wanted to be a spy or a scientist. I
thought you would help me become one.
You made me fall in love. With you. And unknown to
my parents, with language.
I started to write. But that is another story.
I loved you too much. Loved you through all those long
nights when you made me cry. When you simply
wouldn’t listen to me. And when I couldn’t find the
words to tell my love to you.
Living with you was very memorable. Too much fun.
And we were getting better by the day. At least, I was.
Until you decided to add some spice.
I was too weak for them.
To stay ahead of me, you would type on your own. I
don\\\\\\\’t kno\\w what\ these sl\\\\\\\\ashes meant
but they wo\\\\\\uld come everytime I sto\\\pped to
pause. \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
When you knew this didn’t excite me, you stopped.
Much later
In yopur effoprt at unity, yopu started putting the op’s
and p’s together. I never knew why.
And-one-hot-summer-morning-the-space-bar-konked-out-i-had-to-separate-every-single-word-by-the-use-of-hyphens-or-dashes-and-i-could-not-even-run-the word-counts-and-oh-it-was-so-bad-but-still-i-put-up-with-you. Familiarity-with-you-never-bred-contempt-it-gave-birth-to-love-to-comfort-to-knowing-all-your-little-quirks.Disabling-that-vital-cord-which-tied-you-was-so-easy-and-even-so-legal-but-i-resisted-i-always-gave-you-chances-and-i-thought-that-your-teasing-would-be-over-soon-soon-anytime-soon-alas-it-was-not-to-be.You-had-grown-haughty-and-ill-tempered-and-God-i-still-loved-you.Not-to-love-a-strong-woman-was-very-demeaning-on-me.
One night you repaired yourself. I never asked you how.
Questions are prohibited in love affairs with me.
Finally, you crashed.
You misbehaved, threw your tiny tantrums.
You showed me your keyboard ego.
Or was it my zeal and drive.
Did I misuse-abuse-overuse you?
I loved you. I still do.
You were a great mistress.
Only, you took an early retirement.
| love |
When the God drank milk
This was the second time
He spanned the world
So quickly. . . In telecast
miracles that occurred from
Michigan to Manila to Madras
Whether He was in plastic, ceramic,
Fire-burnt clay or stiff black stone
The Elephant-Headed, the Pot-Bellied,
The Remover of Obstacles, Ganesha,
The God had his fill as he sucked
The spoonfuls of creamy milk. . .
I am not willing to listen to
Capillary Action Rationalism
Or any scientific explorations. . .
Instead I am hunting for some
Silly girl’s bizarre secret, to know if
The Son of Shiva had let himself
To be breastfed, to be suckled. . .
And if she, having tasted success
At His having tasted her,
Moved on to younger,
Charming Gods,
With their mouths
Full of white teeth.
| joy |
Prayers
In an arid land of arid human minds
Caste, yet again authored a tragedy.
He, disease wrecked, downtrodden,
long-ago skinner of animals, sets out.
Ten days of Typhoid, and a partial recovery.
Enough reason to thank some God.
He drags himself clumsily to a nearby temple.
Sadly, of an Upper-caste God.
Away from the temple, he bends in supplication.
Says his last prayer—Unwelcome Gratefulness.
To a God who (anyway) didn’t help him recover.
Innocent Acts of Undulating Faith spurned
Anger. Retaliation.
An irked Rajput surged forth
and smote the untouchable with a iron rod.
He, warrior caste lion couldn’t tolerate
Encroachment. At the temple. By a Dalit.
Deathly howls of a feeble-voiced
rent the air, fervently seeking holy intervention.
God, Lifeless as ever—watched grimly with closed eyes.
In resigned submission, the sick man’s Life was given away.
Caste—crueler than disease, emotionless, dry, took its toll
Confirming traditional truths: Dalits die, due to devotion.
Unanswered questions remain;
Agony is not always a forgotten memory.
Life teaches: there are different Gods at different temples.
One solitary thought haunts recollection day and night.
Where did this poor man’s sixty-five year old soul go?
To Heaven – to join noble martyrs who died for a cause?
Or to Hell—where the Gods reside, making Caste Laws.
| sad |
Narration
I’ll weep to you about
My landlord, and with
My mature gestures—
You will understand:
The torn sari, disheveled hair
Stifled cries and meek submission.
I was not an untouchable then.
I’ll curse the skies,
And shout: scream to you
Words that incite wrath and
You will definitely know:
The priest, his lecherous eyes,
Glances that disrobed, defiled.
I was not polluting at four feet.
How can I say
Anything, anything
Against my own man?
How?
So I take shelter in silence
Wear it like a mask.
When alone, I stumble
Into a flood of incoherencies. . .
| sad |
We real hot
(Inspired by ‘We Real Cool’ by Gwendolyn Brooks)
We real hot. We
Ne’er rot. We
Know knack. We
Beat back. We
Shock stars. We
Win wars. We
Ne’er late. We
Fuck Fate.
| sad |
Mohandas Karamchand
“Generations to come will scarcely
believe that such a one as this walked
the earth in flesh and blood.”
—Albert Einstein
Who? Who? Who?
Mahatma. Sorry no.
Truth. Non-violence.
Stop it. Enough taboo.
That trash is long overdue.
You need a thorough review.
Your tax-free salt stimulated our wounds
We gonna sue you, the Congress shoe.
Gone half-cuckoo, you called us names,
You dubbed us pariahs—“Harijans”
goody-goody guys of a bigot god
Ram Ram Hey Ram—boo.
Don’t ever act like a holy saint.
we can see through you, impure you.
Remember, how you dealt with your poor wife.
But, they wrote your books, they made your life.
They stuffed you up, the imposter true.
And sew you up—filled you with virtue
and gave you all that glossy deeds
enough reason we still lick you.
You knew, you bloody well knew,
Caste won’t go, they wouldn’t let it go.
It haunts us now, the way you do
with a spooky stick, a eerie laugh or two.
But they killed you, the naked you,
your blood with mud was gooey goo.
Sadist fool, you killed your body
many times before this too.
Bapu, bapu, you big fraud, we hate you.
| sad |
Maariamma
Posted on June 1, 2008 | 2 Comments
We understand
why upper caste Gods
and their ‘good-girl’ much-married, father-fucked,
virgin, vegetarian oh-so-pure Goddesses
borne in their golden chariots
don’t come to our streets.
We know the reasons for their non-entry into slums.
Actually, our poverty would soil their hears
and our labor corrupt their souls.
But Maariamma,
when you are still getting
those roosters and goats,
why have you stopped coming to our doors?
Maari, our girl,
since when did you join their gang?
| sad |
Hymns of a hag
I fancy myself being a witch.
Broomstick borne and black as pitch.
Thin, stark-naked and with fire for eyes.
Killing men whom I despise.
Bewailing the woeful life I led.
Casting dark spells, makin’ them dead.
Thronging ghettos, to unbend bent backs.
Handing them knives, ’least an axe.
Lot later I fly to temple streets.
Our men firm, I show my feats.
Haunting oppressors to shave their heads.
Cutting all their holy threads.
Experiencing joy as they bleed.
Dance, rejoice my black black deed.
Leave one farewell note, an obscene cue:
‘Judgment day is long since due.’
Ultimately, I’ll lie in the ditch—
Ne’er give a damn, when called ‘Bitch’
| sad |
For sale
My school bud, he work hard.
He slog. He make money.
He grow dam rich.
He go to da temple, where
his po’ ol’ folks ain’t allowed.
He buy incense for two bucks
flowers for five, kinda shaggy
coconut for ten bucks.
He also buy a standing place
at da front and da special prayer
in his name all at twenty more.
Priest with ash and holy smoke
come to him, give extra blesses for
a cool crisp fifty my bud gives.
He stand there and stare,
stare hard at the Gawd;
his first time in temple.
Then my jus Blessed bud, he ask me:
Say, ya, how much da “Luxmee” cost?
| joy |
Fire
Black satanic fumes
shroud the blank blue skies
in puffing jet black soot;
few flashy cameras record
glimpses of destruction
(for tomorrow’s papers). . .
Our huts are burning—
Regular huts in proper rows.
Dry thatches (conspirators-in-crime)
feed the flames as we rush out
shrieking-crying-moaning
open mouthed hysterical curses
and as if in an answer—
when the blazing work is done
Fire engines arrive . . .
Deliberately late.
These feverish cries continue
in the same shrilly pitch
echo, echo, echo and
finally reach. . .
Up there.
Reverberate and sound as loud
as snail shells crackling under nailed boots
and perhaps as distinct and defenseless.
This double catastrophe projected in sights
and shrieks evokes. . .
No response.
Those above are (mostly):
indifferent bastards.
| sad |
Evil spirits
You are possessed.
Witch doctors believe in phantoms,
that cause your illness. But, driving out devils
can be challenging. Spirits are given away—
We are made to sit opposite you,
Force-fed a ‘meal’—bland food mixed
with your hair, nails, spit and pus.
Illegally (despite the government ban),
We take your hoard of evil spirits
Barter-system: for having ate your food.
And because ghosts and ghouls
obey your rules, they leave you to come to us.
Is this ‘transference’? An unofficial appeasement.
We become inhabited by the dead,
who ruins our doomed lives. Demons in our
bodies are brutal tenants and frequently,
They suck with their vampire tongues
to drink our anemic blood —
leave their puncture marks, which
can be faintly seen on our black skins;
skins that bear greater scars,
reminders of larger, human cruelty. . .
Anyway, there isn’t a lot of life in our bodies.
We are souls. Wandering souls. Still, once
Ghost-tasted, we rot away. We rot away.
Remember, rotting is a long procedure. . .
Day by day, we grow coffin cold and slowly
Life creeps out, a lazy earthworm.
At last, we die.
We die.
| fear |
Ekalaivan
This note comes as a consolation:
You can do a lot of things
With your left hand.
Besides, fascist Dronacharyas warrant
Left-handed treatment.
Also,
You don’t need your right thumb,
To pull a trigger or hurl a bomb.
| sad |
Becoming a Brahmin
Algorithm for converting a Shudra into a Brahmin
Begin.
Step 1: Take a beautiful Shudra girl.
Step 2: Make her marry a Brahmin.
Step 3: Let her give birth to his female child.
Step 4: Let this child marry a Brahmin.
Step 5: Repeat steps 3-4 six times.
Step 6: Display the end product. It is a Brahmin.
End.
Algorithm advocated by Father of the Nation at Tirupur.
Documented by Periyar on 20.09.1947.
Algorithm for converting a Pariah into a Brahmin
Awaiting another Father of the Nation
to produce this algorithm.
(Inconvenience caused due to inadvertent delay
is sincerely regretted.)
| joy |
Another Paradise Lost
One sleepy summer afternoon, while helping
myself to a glass of chilled water, I saw a
snake lying curled under the fridge. It could
have been a very poisonous cobra. Very
quickly, I chose my mode of attack: Acid.
Staggering, I reached for the glass bottle
so that I could pour the yellow-green cheap
acid on its slimy body, burning it to death.
“Stop it”, the snake hissed in pure Tamil
connecting with me in the language of
my prayer and poetry. “I am an exile.”
And I configured mental images of political
refugees. It wriggled out and I saw that
it was balding, almost Rushdie-like, perhaps
with a death sentence too. Controversy was a
crowd pulling catch-phrase, to which I dutifully
succumbed. Acid bottle in hand, I heard the
snake preach to me about living in detachment.
“The perfection of life is when you do not
know the difference between yielding and
resisting.” The scrawny being writhed further
and told me of rebirth and reincarnation. Being
a writer I really wanted to take notes. Instead
I began arguing. “Shut up”, the snake said to me,
“Karma and the whole stuff that follows it is just
bunkum. You, a crazed agnostic, disagree because
of borrowed ideas.” Sharp movements of the red
tongue terrified me. Almost sensing my fear, it
said, “You could never challenge what you do
not comprehend.” The snake spoke in circles, in
patterns that could only resemble a snake
swallowing its tail. Whatever. And then it
occurred to me: Speech was the oldest trap,
the charming deceiver, persuasion’s weapon
and Satan’s first area of expertise. “Stop it”,
this time I said the words. “Tell me just your
story. Save the cant and rant for critical times.”
My acidic tone gained me a menacing status
and I continued, “You are a mean serpent.
Instigator. Trouble-maker. Sly liar. Undulating
temptation-provider. Unworthy reminder
of the seduction of strength over matter.” It
protested in a booming resonant voice, “No, I
am not any of this. I am just an exile, from
paradise. Because of your Catholic upbringing,
you don’t even know about the paradise lost
in Hinduism.” Who bothered for history or
heritage, except shriveling snakes and failed
writers? At least, we both had something in
common. “Look here comrade, my credentials
are different. In heaven, I was an activist. An
avid dissenter. Before the accession to heaven,
long long ago, I was a mighty monarch on earth,
feared and respected. I was Nahusa the Great.
My subjects were happy, the kingdom prosperous.
And I ruled for twelve thousand years, until the day
when I decided that I could take leave of life. In
heaven too, I was venerated. But one question had
plagued me all the years of my long life, and it still
tormented me in heaven. I wanted to know why
caste was there, why people suffered because of
their karmas. I questioned the Gods, and the learned
sages there. I asked them what would happen if an
high-born did manual work just like the low-born.
I worried about the division of labor, this disparity
in dreams and destinies. You could say I was a rebel
pleading for liberty-equality-fraternity. I had a riotous
history of revolution. The Gods plotted against me,
decided that I was trouble. I was cursed to turn into
a vile snake. I was banished from paradise. For sixty
million years, I shall roam the earth, and then I may
return.” This was a different case of the paradise lost.
In this tale, there was no forbidden fruit, no second
fickle-minded woman. Tradition triumphed over reason
and the good were cast away. I let the serpent go,
happy that he had given my hungry mind a story, or
perhaps, a poem to be written on unfair days. I began
to respect snakes — the challengers of hierarchy.
While I gave him the freedom of safe passage
I vowed never to kill serpents. Much later
I realized brutally that this was just another
occupational hazard for choosing a life
where I was to be showing solidarity
with activists and dissenters.
| sad |
Aggression
Ours is a silence
that waits. Endlessly waits.
And then, unable to bear it
any further, it breaks into wails.
But not all suppressed reactions
end in our bemoaning the tragedy.
Sometimes,
the outward signals
of inward struggles takes colossal forms
And the revolution happens because our dreams explode.
Most of the time:
Aggression is the best kind of trouble-shooting.
| anger |
Advaita: The ultimate question
Non Dualism
Atman Self
Brahman God
Are Equal
And Same.
So I
Untouchable Outcast
Am God.
Will You
Ever Agree?
No Matter
What You
Preach Answer
Me. Through
Your Saints.
One More
Final Question
Can My
Untouchable Atman
And Your
Brahmin Atman
Ever Be
One
?
| hate |
Touch
Have you ever tried meditation?
Struggling hard to concentrate,
and keeping your mind as blank
as a whitewashed wall by closing
your eyes, nose, ears; and shutting out
every possible thought. Every thing.
And, the only failure, that ever came,
the only gross betrayal—
was from your own skin.
You will have known this.
Do you still remember,
how, the first distractions arose?
And you blamed skin as a sinner;
how, when your kundalini was rising,
shaken, you felt the cold concrete floor
skin rubbing against skin, your saffron robes,
how, even in a far-off different realm—
your skin anchored you to this earth.
Amidst all that pervading emptiness,
touch retained its sensuality.
You will have known this.
Or if you thought more variedly, about
taste, you would discount it—as the touch
of the tongue. Or, you may recollect
how a gentle touch, a caress changed
your life multifold, and you were never
the person you should have been.
Feeling with your skin, was
perhaps the first of the senses, its
reality always remained with you—
You never got rid of it.
You will have known this.
You will have known almost
every knowledgeable thing about
the charms and the temptations
that touch could hold.
But, you will never have known
that touch – the taboo
to your transcendence,
when crystallized in caste
was a paraphernalia of
undeserving hate.
| sad |
Love and war
two thousand years ago
our word for love
was the same.
women and men
wrote their songs of love
the intimacies of inside
and they spoke of how
love was tireless
love was a fantasy feast
love was no disease
love was no evil goddess
love was a harshness, in the parting
love was
‘the thing that made a girl’s bangles
slip loose when her lord went away
grow tight when her lord returned’
love was (they sang)
‘bigger than the earth
higher than the sky
unfathomable than the waters.’
love was.
no names were named.
you did not know
who he was
or who she was
or when it was
or where it was
only
love was.
and there were
the poems of war,
the war poetry
poems on the outside
(and perhaps
because the bards
wore lotuses of gold)
there are
the poems
where the names were named
where the kings were praised
where a bard addressed another
where the guide sang to the patron
where the poet sang to the courtesan
where mothers spoke of tigers in their wombs
where the kingdom was
‘an unfailing harvest of
victorious wars’
where the old women
‘threatened to slash their breasts
if their sons died in battle with backs
turned in fright’
where the end spoke of
‘the blood glowing
in the red center of the battlefield
like the sky before nightfall’
and because it has an end
war was a history.
love never has an end.
love was. and will be.
| love |
If everything comes crashing down
And both of us become strangers onto each other
Do not worry about me.
We will look beyond eyes and run into each other
As usual, for the rest of life.
I do not know what you would
Treasure of me in your mind.
But in billboards planted
Across my fervent heart,
I will celebrate you as the man
Who made me woman.
And there are the small things that I would always remember:
Your affinity to catch colds; my rising fevers on seeing you
Your headaches, your backaches; my avowed helplessness
Your falling asleep while waiting for my reply
Your asking me to remain with you for all of time. . .
All your delicious lies. . .
Over the phone,
the sound of your drinking water,
the soundlessness of your yawn. . .
the camouflage of who you were talking to
the new meanings you gave to worn-out words
Yes, all of this.
And that once,
You called me a goddess.
| sad |
Monologue
I speak alone because
I do not know his answers.
And yet, you want to be heard.
I want to tell him that I have
Closed and sealed my skin.
Baby, I told you, love can hurt.
I have exiled my heart.
This is a lonely, lonely world,
Even with a lover.
Since I know the difference
Between believing and being in love
Oh! you know nothing.
I have stopped
My frantic search
For the Buddhas
Only they came to you,
In ones, twos, tens.
When I thought of
Yasodhara, his wife
Left behind alone and
Large with child . . .
What about the good things, eh?
Recollect them. Remember that
Memory is a mere vending machine . .
| sad |
He replaces poetry
Two months into love and today I turn into a whore
Hunting for words, tearing them out from soiled sheets
Of mind or pinching them from the world like removing
Jade-green flecks from tiger’s eyes. . . And poetry refuses
Entry into my mirrored life that is bequeathed to him.
I try the mad-woman’s antics: I have pulled my hair and
Bruised my thin wrists and bit the insides of my cheeks till
They have bled a warm red sourness and I have starved
In arrogance to call the words home to me and thrown up
To clear me of him but he, strong dark man, refuses to budge,
Give way or take leave. My dark nights of savage tears have
Gone in search of needy shores deserting me (with the devil
Of a lover who sleeps half-a-dozen streams apart) and so
Have the words that once made me the sad lone woman
I was, and pretended to be. I am happy now he says and
I nod, like a Tanjore doll in breeze, and reply in cloying tones
This is happiness. I know I do not indulge in lies or delusion but
This is happiness and happiness is a hollow world for fools to
Inhabit, where all the dreams eventually die by coming to life.
Love has smothered me to a gay inertia and I long for a little
Hurt and pain that will let me scream and I wait for offending
Words to row me into worlds where I shall cry wildly for whole
Nights like the lament of lonely, old and greying seas. . . Then
Sadness shall come back with its dancing fairy lights and nail me
To wailing crosses. . . Poetry, in the end, shall replace all of him.
| sad |
Non-conversations with a lover
don’t talk to me
of sudden love. . .
in our land
even the monsoons come—
leisurely, strolling like
decorated temple elephants
(the pomp, the paraphernalia)—
after months of monotonous prayer,
preparations and palpitating waits.
my darling
his silence
(those still shoulders)
but his eyes dance
his eyes dance
(so wild, so wild)
so i think of raging
summer storms—
like uncontrollable tuskers
trampling in mast
(the madness, the lust)—
across the forests of our land. . .
| joy |
Whispered intimacies
And I got your words
Today.
I will have them painted
Tonight.
Try to choose
Or take them all.
Glitter on innocent
Raspberry lips that plead
For touch, for closer
Communion.
Composition in coffee
Cream blending with bitter
Chocolate worn on business
Days.
Ravenous red, for fiery
Animals in us, tamed,
By love in dying
Languages.
Colourless words, invisible
But everywhere—Love
Reserved for needy
Nights.
Love, remember the rain
And our fading words
On lonely nights
Drenching—Drizzling—
Straying to a steady
Chatter or studied
Silence.
Remember our
Whispered intimacies
Which still linger on lips.
Remember that some words
Which once beheld promise
Now hold our bodies
In motion.
| love |
Mulligatawny dreams
anaconda. candy. cash. catamaran.
cheroot. coolie. corundum. curry.
ginger. mango. mulligatawny.
patchouli. poppadom. rice.
tatty. teak. vetiver.
i dream of an english
full of the words of my language.
an english in small letters
an english that shall tire a white man’s tongue
an english where small children practice with smooth round
pebbles in their mouth to the spell the right zha
an english where a pregnant woman is simply stomach-child-lady
an english where the magic of black eyes and brown bodies
replaces the glamour of eyes in dishwater blue shades
and the airbrush romance of pink white cherry blossom skins
an english where love means only the strange frenzy
between a man and his beloved, not between him and his car
an english without the privacy of its many rooms
an english with suffixes for respect
an english with more than thirty six words to call the sea
an english that doesn’t belittle brown or black men and women
an english of tasting with five fingers
an english of talking love with eyes alone
and i dream of an english
where men
of that spiky, crunchy tongue
buy flower-garlands of jasmine
to take home to their coy wives
for the silent demand of a night of wordless whispered love . . .
| joy |
You don’t know if you are yielding or resisting
it is the last day of the year
and you think about writing
a farewell poem for the year
that was, for the year you
began writing poetry
you think of the tragedies
you know, you even plan
to write about naming your only
daughter (whenever she is born,
anyway) after a suicide-bomber
you try to think of fear and hate
and some devious defence for all
those sins you had painstakingly
planned to do just so that your
poetry has more life and colour
and verve and in the end it might
appear that you have experience
you strive like mad to avoid writing
poems about your unseen lover,
you concede deep within that you
do not know his name or age or what
he murders for a living, yet he weaves
his way into every poem of yours
you want to write that single poem
which is free of him, which does not
carry the stains of his masculine scent
and which doesn’t make you think of
his hairless chest and the deftness of his
fingers on you and god yes god his eyes
you want to write a poem just for yourself,
a poem where you do not cringe
or stand shame-faced at his
worship of himself and how
silently and steadfastly he
has made you worship him
you have always known that
your knowledge of him was
very limited—that expecting
the stranger to caress you when
you cry is an insane idea—
after all when your lover comes
he has no memory about the
days and months and years he has
spent inside your heart and he does
not wish to hear for how long you
have harboured him right between
your breasts
you notice the clock tick away
and again you give up writing
that poem for it always eludes you
then,
you succumb to all your cravings
and write all you can about him
forgetting the shame and the
embarrassment it would cause
somehow it seems better than
not writing anything at all.
| sad |
Storming in tea-cups
Posted on June 1, 2008 | Leave a comment
“a cup of tea is not a cup of tea. . .
when you make it at twilight,
just for him.”
call it a love potion.
liquid dreams.
scented desire.
wishes boiled to a blend.
three cinnamon pods
the dried darjeeling leaves
milk and pearl-white cream
simmering to a syrup to be filtered.
as you sweat in its vapours
and imagine how the tea tastes
against his lips his teeth his tongue
and the pale pink insides of his throat
as you stir in the sugar
and test a spoonful to see
if it stings and soothes and
stimulates the way you intended
as you pour it into his cup
with eyes mirroring supernovas and
study the desirable brown of the tea
an entire shade
that fits exactly
between the desert sand of your skin
and the date palm of his.
almost the color
of your possible child.
| love |
Frenzied Light
When you called me
To light up your life
I could never refuse.
But, there are things I ask of you.
Love, I can’t be a candle
For I know it is an ancient lie.
The candle is for the solemn,
And for those who yearn a slow
And settled tenderness. Not for us.
It is for those who can bear to leave
A mass of their waste, the dregs of their glory.
O, it is for the selfish who seek to burn through a medium.
Love, I will promise you a substitute.
I could be that piece of holy camphor
So safely locked away from prying hands.
And dearest, when I burn for you, that single time
Nothing shall remain of me, or of you, except that flash
Of memory. Our blending shall be so sublime, so intense, so total.
Come, consume me,
Devastate me love, if you ever will,
But with a force that I will forever remember.
| love |
Fuchsia shock
My bed smells of textbooks
and it is more than a month or so,
since I dreamt of sunlight and the sky’s
embrace. Even a woman’s lush vanities —
scarlet silk and shining gold — have been lost
on me. I am snared in a world of aqua, fuchsia,
and lime set dangerously against black and white.
Words tightly wrapped,
and imprisoned in a cluster of
highlighter colours, share my slavery.
Rattling loud, the colorized intrusions
have pickled the past, leaving me to savour
saturation. Oh hell, even my treasured dreams
have been bleached away in shades of three, or five.
Save me, from this
unbearable starkness
of fluorescence; where lines
rehash the pages brutally, moving
with sounds of spectacled scrutiny.
For, all that I can bear to comprehend
is the loss of dare: my sheltered cowardice.
And, the sole comfort I crave, through stifled
tears is stolen love beneath stained glass windows.
Dearest, lavish your love
in slender earthtone shades,
in the colours of skin singing —
to shield our renewed dreams,
and to believe, once more, in absolutes.
| sad |
Excerpts from a study guide
Teach him not to seek
Where he has been taught to find. . .
***
Lead him into the land
Of silences—Ignore his words of praise
Where all the perfidy hides. . .
***
Because the climax of a dream
Is its return to reality, let him cling
To your laughter, to your eyes that shine of light. . .
***
Make him study the gilt of gold
Against the wan brown of your skin but let him choose. . .
***
Exhibit your flawless arms
Dearest child of 1984—no vaccination mark
Nothing to remind him of his Maari or small pox. . .
***
Lead him to count the moles
On your skin but force him to begin
With the beauty spot above your lips. . .
***
Talk to him of that summer of chickenpox
That left you almost unscathed, but show him
The unbeautiful gash where metal seared eight-year skin. . .
***
Tell him the history of your Raphunzel hair
That tickled your shins. And of a cruel world that sapped
You, so your hair cannot reach down to cover your shame. . .
***
Press his ears against your skin
And hear him announce—the dance
Is in the bones, the dance is in the blood. . .
***
He shall chart and plot
And map, but shrewd girl
Bring him up to worship you. . .
***
Allow him to memorize all of you
So that, some day, he shall ravish you
Screaming fiery love-words in your mother-tongue. . .
***
He would have
Learnt your lesson, by then. . .
| joy |
Lines addressed to a warrior
come.
colonise me.
creep into the hollows
of my landscape—my eyes click lock:
no more the drawing of the gates.
set up your home your office
the writing desk and the trading post.
ignore the sand-brown
of my skin—a willing blind
i’ll never know black from white.
take me and talk of your finer finish
stunned i yield, so script your stories here.
invade.
this inner-space.
adjust the pace and pulse
of marching armies—and house
your machine guns, its manuals.
populate me with anthems
the songs of wrath and those of war.
draft words that echo
of gunfire, to accompany
my lone dance of submission.
though prose mad and power crazy, you
conquer me, never with malice or manhood.
capture.
every territory.
fill up all my blank skin
to resound with the strike of scimitars,
the sadness of success.
have all your battles lost, or won,
chronicled across my line of down.
| joy |
My lover speaks of rape
Flaming green of a morning that awaits rain
And my lover speaks of rape through silences,
Swallowed words and the shadowed tones
Of voice. Quivering, I fill in his blanks.
Green turns to unsightly teal of hospital beds
And he is softer than feathers, but I fly away
To shield myself from the retch of the burns
Ward, the shrill sounds of dying declarations,
The floral pink-white sad skins of dowry deaths.
Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .
Colorless noon filters in through bluish glass
And coffee keeps him company. She chatters
Away telling her own, every woman’s story;
He listens, like for the first time. Tragedy in
Bridal red remains a fresh, flushing bruise across
Brown-yellow skinscapes, vibrant but made
Muted through years of silent, waiting skin.
I am absent. They talk of everyday assault that
Turns blue, violet and black in high-color symphony.
Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .
Blues blend to an unforgiving metropolitan black
And loneliness seems safer than a gentle night
In his arms. I return from the self-defence lessons:
Mistrust is the black-belted, loose white mechanism
Of survival against this groping world and I am
A convert too. Yet, in the way of all life, he could try
And take root, as I resist, and yield later, like the earth.
Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .
Has he learnt to live my life? Has he learnt never to harm?
| sad |
Their daughters
Paracetamol legends I know
For rising fevers, as pain-relievers—
Of my people—father’s father’s mother’s
Mother, dark lush hair caressing her ankles
Sometimes, sweeping earth, deep-honey skin,
Amber eyes—not beauty alone they say—she
Married a man who murdered thirteen men and one
Lonely summer afternoon her rice-white teeth tore
Through layers of khaki, and golden white skin to spill
The bloodied guts of a British soldier who tried to colonize her. . .
Of my land—uniform blue open skies,
Mad-artist palettes of green lands and lily-filled lakes that
Mirror all—not peace or tranquil alone, he shudders—some
Young woman near my father’s home, with a drunken husband
Who never changed; she bore his beatings everyday until on one
Stormy night, in fury, she killed him by stomping his seedbags. . .
We: their daughters.
We: the daughters of their soil.
We, mostly, write. | sad |
Come silently like the Moon
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Gulshan Ara
Original Language Bengali
O, my love
Come silently in the middle of the night
As gliding moonlight
With your tender touch
Bring sweet dreams to my eyes
O, my love, never again
I will need to open the door,
Come quietly through the door of my heart
Be there forever in my sweet memory
Come as the fragrance of un-blossomed flowers
Swaying in the evening breeze
Sing out my name over and over again
Like love-stricken evening bird in the wilderness
Come as tear drops in my eyes
Whisper in my ears like soothing tune of flute
Come as my lost love
O my ever lost love
Be there as eternal pain in my heart. | sad |
He who has seen my Mother
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Rachel Fell McDermott
Original Language Bengali
He who has seen my Mother
can he hate his brother?
She loves everyone in the three worlds;
her heart cries for all.
With her there's no difference of caste,
no distinction between high and low;
all are the same.
If she sees a Candala
like Rama with Guhak
she clasps him to her breast.
Ma is our Great Illusion, highest Nature, and
Father our highest Self;
that's why one feels love for all
we feel love for all.
If you worship the Mother
hating her children
she won't accept your puja;
the Ten-Armed One will not.
The day we forget the knowledge of difference
on that day only
will Ma come home to us.
| love |
Let's Meet Hereafter!
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Mohammad Omar Farooq
Original Language Bengali
We will meet again in the life Hereafter;
Here, please, forget me with a simple laughter.
Anything that remained unsaid,
I won't say; Let you also keep silence;
If I offer my love, turn me away;
If I persist, hurt me, in pretense.
Dream is broken abruptly here,
The evening's bud sheds in the dawn;
The heart dries up before love is savored;
The ambrosia here has the taste of poison.
In separation here, heart longs in agony;
When together, quickly we go apart;
Where the fountain of love is never dry,
In that everlasting Garden, remember to seek my heart.
| sad |
mother, i may have been a naughty child
by Nazrul Islam
Original Language Bengali
mother, i may have been a naughty child,
but i am your child nevertheless!
you own the world, mother, you are the queen of the world,
and look at me, i go about in the habit of a beggar.
you are bent on neglecting me,
but i love you anyway, it is you,?only you that i call upon.
just as a child runs to his mother even after she has scolded him,
so do i run to you.
how could you push me away from you, mother,
you are my mother, are you not?
oh, why did you cast me away, mother,
leave me to play in the dust?
i would have been a better child,
had only you been a little more kind to me.
i am sad and angry, mother,
i shall go away anywhere my eyes and my feet take me to.
i do not care now whether i live or die now, mother,
i am going away. | sad |
O Nightingale!
by Nazrul Islam
English version by John Thorpe
Original Language Bengali
In Garden Plot, O Nightingale, do not
rock upon this flower stem today;
For these buds swinging in deep sleep,
Unbroken dozing slumber lay.
Oh how north winds blow now!
Empty branches bow, day and night!
Absent is the southern breeze,
singing melodies, honey bees are in dismay!
When will that virgin flower
sunder sleeps power, opening wide in blossom?
By morning cheeks in red, breaking slumber's stay.
Springtime wakes the bud wide,
breaking each side, bringing a flowering flood.
Flowering bud's, parting lips pursed
into laughter burst, dimpled cheeks display.
Oh poet! you forgot the scent, so
sinking down low, fail to find that shore.
The flower in past, that had filled your breast,
Now, o'erflowed it lies, 'neath a flood of watering eyes. | sad |
Song of Dawn
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Sajed Kamal
Original Language Bengali
It's dawn,-
open the door,
wake up, Khukumoni!
The jasmine flowers
from their vines
are calling you to come running,
wake up, Khukumoni!
Uncle Sun
is crawling out
all dressed in a crimson shirt,
listen -- the gatekeeper
is singing
his song, "Rama hoi."
The birds
are leaving their nests
to fly in the sky,
listen to them
singing continuously,
filling the morning air!
The restless
Bulbul birds
whistle from flower to flower,
this time,
this time,
Khukumoni will open her eyes!
Setting the rudder,
hoisting the sail,
the boat begins its journey,
this time,
this time,
Khukumoni has opened her eyes!
Lazy
she's not--
she's an early-riser,
that's why
Brother Moon
gives a teep everyday for her!
Up
and running--
all the little boys and girls,
listen to them
babbling
about who woke up first!
Night's
wash up
wake up, Khukumoni!
With a hymn
let's begin
asking for a blessing from God! | love |
Syama wakes on the cremation grounds
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Rachel Fell McDermott
Original Language Bengali
Syama wakes on the cremation grounds
to take Her child
at the final hour
to Her lap.
The peaceful Mother sits on the pyre
in fire hidden by Her sari of love.
To hold him on Her lap
She left the Kailasa of Her joy, and
with blessings and fearlessness in Her hands
made the cremation grounds Her home.
Why fear this place
when you'll sleep peacefully at the Mother's feet?
Who dies ignited by the flames of this world,
to him the Mother calls:
"Come to My lap, come to My lap."
To lull you to sleep, Oh Wearied by Life,
Ma takes you to Her lap
disguised as death.
| sad |
Talk to me, javas, talk to me
by Nazrul Islam
English version by Rachel Fell McDermott
Original Language Bengali
Talk to me, javas, talk to me --
what austerities did you do to get Syama Ma's feet?
Torn from your stems on illusion's plants,
falling scattered to the ground at Her feet,
you got liberation
bursting open
beside yourselves with joy.
If only I could learn from your example
my life might bear fruit.
Thousands of sweet-smelling flowers bloom in the woods,
and they're all such beauties! So how come
you got Ma's feet?
You're just ignoran't javas!
Crimson like you at the Mother's feet,
when will they be flowers
offered to Her, blessed by Her?
When will they turn red
at the touch of Her feet?
When will they, just like you, blush scarlet --
these dull petals of my mind? | joy |
A Moments Indulgence
I ask for a moment's indulgence to sit by thy side. The works
that I have in hand I will finish afterwards.
Away from the sight of thy face my heart knows no rest nor respite,
and my work becomes an endless toil in a shoreless sea of toil.
Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove.
Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure. | love |
Authorship
You say that father write a lot of books, but what he write I don't
understand.
He was reading to you all the evening, but could you really
make out what he meant?
What nice stores, mother, you can tell us! Why can't father
write like that, I wonder?
Did he never hear from his own mother stories of giants and
fairies and princesses?
Has he forgotten them all?
Often when he gets late for his bath you have to and call him
an hundred times.
You wait and keep his dishes warm for him, but he goes on
writing and forgets.
Father always plays at making books.
If ever I go to play in father's room, you come and call me,
"What a naughty child!"
If I make the slightest noise you say, "Don't you see that
father's at his work?"
What's the fun of always writing and writing?
When I take up father's pen or pencil and write upon his book
just as he does,-a,b,c,d,e,f,g,h,i,-why do you get cross with me
then, mother?
You never say a word when father writes.
When my father wastes such heaps of paper, mother, you don't
seem to mind at all.
But if I take only one sheet to take a boat with, you say,
"Child, how troublesome you are!"
What do you think of father's spoiling sheets and sheets of
paper with black marks all over both sides? | anger |
Baby's Way
If baby only wanted to, he could fly up to heaven this moment.
It is not for nothing that he does not leave us.
He loves to rest his head on mother's bosom, and cannot ever
bear to lose sight of her.
Baby know all manner of wise words, though few on earth can
understand their meaning.
It is not for nothing that he never wants to speak.
The one thing he wants is to learn mother's words from
mother's lips. That is why he looks so innocent.
Baby had a heap of gold and pearls, yet he came like a beggar
on to this earth.
It is not for nothing he came in such a disguise.
This dear little naked mendicant pretends to be utterly
helpless, so that he may beg for mother's wealth of love.
Baby was so free from every tie in the land of the tiny
crescent moon.
It was not for nothing he gave up his freedom.
He knows that there is room for endless joy in mother's little
corner of a heart, and it is sweeter far than liberty to be caught
and pressed in her dear arms.
Baby never knew how to cry. He dwelt in the land of perfect
bliss.
It is not for nothing he has chosen to shed tears.
Though with the smile of his dear face he draws mother's
yearning heart to him, yet his little cries over tiny troubles
weave the double bond of pity and love. | love |
Baby's Way
If baby only wanted to, he could fly up to heaven this moment.
It is not for nothing that he does not leave us.
He loves to rest his head on mother's bosom, and cannot ever
bear to lose sight of her.
Baby know all manner of wise words, though few on earth can
understand their meaning.
It is not for nothing that he never wants to speak.
The one thing he wants is to learn mother's words from
mother's lips. That is why he looks so innocent.
Baby had a heap of gold and pearls, yet he came like a beggar
on to this earth.
It is not for nothing he came in such a disguise.
This dear little naked mendicant pretends to be utterly
helpless, so that he may beg for mother's wealth of love.
Baby was so free from every tie in the land of the tiny
crescent moon.
It was not for nothing he gave up his freedom.
He knows that there is room for endless joy in mother's little
corner of a heart, and it is sweeter far than liberty to be caught
and pressed in her dear arms.
Baby never knew how to cry. He dwelt in the land of perfect
bliss.
It is not for nothing he has chosen to shed tears.
Though with the smile of his dear face he draws mother's
yearning heart to him, yet his little cries over tiny troubles
weave the double bond of pity and love. | joy |
Beggarly Heart
When the heart is hard and parched up,
come upon me with a shower of mercy.
When grace is lost from life,
come with a burst of song.
When tumultuous work raises its din on all sides shutting me out from
beyond, come to me, my lord of silence, with thy peace and rest.
When my beggarly heart sits crouched, shut up in a corner,
break open the door, my king, and come with the ceremony of a king.
When desire blinds the mind with delusion and dust, O thou holy one,
thou wakeful, come with thy light and thy thunder | peace |
Benediction
Bless this little heart, this white soul that has won the kiss of
heaven for our earth.
He loves the light of the sun, he loves the sight of his
mother's face.
He has not learned to despise the dust, and to hanker after
gold.
Clasp him to your heart and bless him.
He has come into this land of an hundred cross-roads.
I know not how he chose you from the crowd, came to your door,
and grasped you hand to ask his way.
He will follow you, laughing the talking, and not a doubt in
his heart.
Keep his trust, lead him straight and bless him.
Lay your hand on his head, and pray that though the waves
underneath grow threatening, yet the breath from above may come and
fill his sails and waft him to the heaven of peace.
Forget him not in your hurry, let him come to your heart and
bless him. | love |
Brink Of Eternity
In desperate hope I go and search for her
in all the corners of my room;
I find her not.
My house is small
and what once has gone from it can never be regained.
But infinite is thy mansion, my lord,
and seeking her I have to come to thy door.
I stand under the golden canopy of thine evening sky
and I lift my eager eyes to thy face.
I have come to the brink of eternity from which nothing can vanish
---no hope, no happiness, no vision of a face seen through tears.
Oh, dip my emptied life into that ocean,
plunge it into the deepest fullness.
Let me for once feel that lost sweet touch
in the allness of the universe.
| sad |
Chain Of Pearls
Mother, I shall weave a chain of pearls for thy neck
with my tears of sorrow.
The stars have wrought their anklets of light to deck thy feet,
but mine will hang upon thy breast.
Wealth and fame come from thee
and it is for thee to give or to withhold them.
But this my sorrow is absolutely mine own,
and when I bring it to thee as my offering
thou rewardest me with thy grace. | sad |
Closed Path
I thought that my voyage had come to its end
at the last limit of my power,---that the path before me was closed,
that provisions were exhausted
and the time come to take shelter in a silent obscurity.
But I find that thy will knows no end in me.
And when old words die out on the tongue,
new melodies break forth from the heart;
and where the old tracks are lost,
new country is revealed with its wonders. | courage |
Clouds and Waves
Mother, the folk who live up in the clouds call out to me-
"We play from the time we wake till the day ends.
We play with the golden dawn, we play with the silver moon."
I ask, "But how am I to get up to you ?"
They answer, "Come to the edge of the earth, lift up your
hands to the sky, and you will be taken up into the clouds."
"My mother is waiting for me at home, "I say, "How can I leave
her and come?"
Then they smile and float away.
But I know a nicer game than that, mother.
I shall be the cloud and you the moon.
I shall cover you with both my hands, and our house-top will
be the blue sky.
The folk who live in the waves call out to me-
"We sing from morning till night; on and on we travel and know
not where we pass."
I ask, "But how am I to join you?"
They tell me, "Come to the edge of the shore and stand with
your eyes tight shut, and you will be carried out upon the waves."
I say, "My mother always wants me at home in the everything-
how can I leave her and go?"
They smile, dance and pass by.
But I know a better game than that.
I will be the waves and you will be a strange shore.
I shall roll on and on and on, and break upon your lap with
laughter.
And no one in the world will know where we both are.
| love |
Colored Toys
When I bring to you colored toys, my child,
I understand why there is such a play of colors on clouds, on water,
and why flowers are painted in tints
---when I give colored toys to you, my child.
When I sing to make you dance
I truly now why there is music in leaves,
and why waves send their chorus of voices to the heart of the listening earth
---when I sing to make you dance.
When I bring sweet things to your greedy hands
I know why there is honey in the cup of the flowers
and why fruits are secretly filled with sweet juice
---when I bring sweet things to your greedy hands.
When I kiss your face to make you smile, my darling,
I surely understand what pleasure streams from the sky in morning light,
and what delight that is that is which the summer breeze brings to my body
---when I kiss you to make you smile. | joy |
Defamation
Whey are those tears in your eyes, my child?
How horrid of them to be always scolding you for nothing!
You have stained your fingers and face with ink while writing-
is that why they call you dirty?
O, fie! Would they dare to call the full moon dirty because
it has smudged its face with ink?
For every little trifle they blame you, my child. They are
ready to find fault for nothing.
You tore your clothes while playing-is that why they call you
untidy?
O, fie! What would they call an autumn morning that smiles
through its ragged clouds?
Take no heed of what they say to you, my child.
They make a long list of your misdeeds.
Everybody knows how you love sweet things-is that why they
call you greedy?
O, fie! What then would they call us who love you? | love |
Distant Time
I know not from what distant time
thou art ever coming nearer to meet me.
Thy sun and stars can never keep thee hidden from me for aye.
In many a morning and eve thy footsteps have been heard
and thy messenger has come within my heart and called me in secret.
I know not only why today my life is all astir,
and a feeling of tremulous joy is passing through my heart.
It is as if the time were come to wind up my work,
and I feel in the air a faint smell of thy sweet presence.
| peace |
Dungeon
He whom I enclose with my name is weeping in this dungeon.
I am ever busy building this wall all around; and as this wall goes up into
the sky day by day I lose sight of my true being in its dark shadow.
I take pride in this great wall, and I plaster it with dust and sand
lest a least hole should be left in this name;
and for all the care I take I lose sight of my true being
Endless Time by Rabindranath Tagore
Time is endless in thy hands, my lord.
There is none to count thy minutes.
Days and nights pass and ages bloom and fade like flowers.
Thou knowest how to wait.
Thy centuries follow each other perfecting a small wild flower.
We have no time to lose,
and having no time we must scramble for a chance.
We are too poor to be late.
And thus it is that time goes by
while I give it to every querulous man who claims it,
and thine altar is empty of all offerings to the last.
At the end of the day I hasten in fear lest thy gate be shut;
but I find that yet there is time. | peace |
Face To Face
Day after day, O lord of my life,
shall I stand before thee face to face.
With folded hands, O lord of all worlds,
shall I stand before thee face to face.
Under thy great sky in solitude and silence,
with humble heart shall I stand before thee face to face.
In this laborious world of thine, tumultuous with toil
and with struggle, among hurrying crowds
shall I stand before thee face to face.
And when my work shall be done in this world,
O King of kings, alone and speechless
shall I stand before thee face to face. | peace |
Fairyland
If people came to know where my king's palace is, it would vanish
into the air.
The walls are of white silver and the roof of shining gold.
The queen lives in a palace with seven courtyards, and she
wears a jewel that cost all the wealth of seven kingdoms.
But let me tell you, mother, in a whisper, where my king's
palace is.
It is at the corner of our terrace where the pot of the tulsi
plant stands.
The princess lies sleeping on the far-away shore of the seven
impassable seas.
There is none in the world who can find her but myself.
She has bracelets on her arms and pearl drops in her ears; her
hair sweeps down upon the floor.
She will wake when I touch her with my magic wand and jewels
will fall from her lips when she smiles.
But let me whisper in your ear, mother; she is there in the
corner of our terrace where the pot of the tulsi plant stands.
When it is time for you to go to the river for your bath, step
up to that terrace on the roof.
I sit in the corner where the shadow of the walls meet
together.
Only puss is allowed to come with me, for she know where the
barber in the story lives.
But let me whisper, mother, in your ear where the barber in
the story lives.
It is at the corner of the terrace where the pot of the tulsi
plant stands.
| joy |
Farewell
I have got my leave. Bid me farewell, my brothers!
I bow to you all and take my departure.
Here I give back the keys of my door
---and I give up all claims to my house.
I only ask for last kind words from you.
We were neighbors for long,
but I received more than I could give.
Now the day has dawned
and the lamp that lit my dark corner is out.
A summons has come and I am ready for my journey.
Flower by Rabindranath Tagore
Pluck this little flower and take it, delay not! I fear lest it
droop and drop into the dust.
I may not find a place in thy garland, but honour it with a touch of
pain from thy hand and pluck it. I fear lest the day end before I am
aware, and the time of offering go by.
Though its colour be not deep and its smell be faint, use this flower
in thy service and pluck it while there is time. | sad |
Fool
O Fool, try to carry thyself upon thy own shoulders!
O beggar, to come beg at thy own door!
Leave all thy burdens on his hands who can bear all,
and never look behind in regret.
Thy desire at once puts out the light from the lamp it touches with its breath.
It is unholy---take not thy gifts through its unclean hands.
Accept only what is offered by sacred love.
| peace |
Free Love
By all means they try to hold me secure who love me in this world.
But it is otherwise with thy love which is greater than theirs,
and thou keepest me free.
Lest I forget them they never venture to leave me alone.
But day passes by after day and thou art not seen.
If I call not thee in my prayers, if I keep not thee in my heart,
thy love for me still waits for my love. | love |
Friend
Art thou abroad on this stormy night
on thy journey of love, my friend?
The sky groans like one in despair.
I have no sleep tonight.
Ever and again I open my door and look out on
the darkness, my friend!
I can see nothing before me.
I wonder where lies thy path!
By what dim shore of the ink-black river,
by what far edge of the frowning forest,
through what mazy depth of gloom art thou threading
thy course to come to me, my friend? | surprise |
Give Me Strength
This is my prayer to thee, my lord---strike,
strike at the root of penury in my heart.
Give me the strength lightly to bear my joys and sorrows.
Give me the strength to make my love fruitful in service.
Give me the strength never to disown the poor or bend my knees before insolent might.
Give me the strength to raise my mind high above daily trifles.
And give me the strength to surrender my strength to thy will with love.
| peace |
Innermost One
He it is, the innermost one,
who awakens my being with his deep hidden touches.
He it is who puts his enchantment upon these eyes
and joyfully plays on the chords of my heart
in varied cadence of pleasure and pain.
He it is who weaves the web of this maya
in evanescent hues of gold and silver, blue and green,
and lets peep out through the folds his feet,
at whose touch I forget myself.
Days come and ages pass,
and it is ever he who moves my heart in many a name,
in many a guise, in many a rapture of joy and of sorrow. | peace |
Journey Home
The time that my journey takes is long and the way of it long.
I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light, and pursued my
voyage through the wildernesses of worlds leaving my track on many a star and planet.
It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,
and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.
The traveler has to knock at every alien door to come to his own,
and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.
My eyes strayed far and wide before I shut them and said `Here art thou!'
The question and the cry `Oh, where?' melt into tears of a thousand
streams and deluge the world with the flood of the assurance `I am!'
| peace |
Last Curtain
I know that the day will come
when my sight of this earth shall be lost,
and life will take its leave in silence,
drawing the last curtain over my eyes.
Yet stars will watch at night,
and morning rise as before,
and hours heave like sea waves casting up pleasures and pains.
When I think of this end of my moments,
the barrier of the moments breaks
and I see by the light of death
thy world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat,
rare is its meanest of lives.
Things that I longed for in vain
and things that I got
---let them pass.
Let me but truly possess
the things that I ever spurned
and overlooked. | peace |
Leave This
Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads!
Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut?
Open thine eyes and see thy God is not before thee!
He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground
and where the pathmaker is breaking stones.
He is with them in sun and in shower,
and his garment is covered with dust.
Put off thy holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil!
Deliverance?
Where is this deliverance to be found?
Our master himself has joyfully taken upon him the bonds of creation;
he is bound with us all for ever.
Come out of thy meditations and leave aside thy flowers and incense!
What harm is there if thy clothes become tattered and stained?
Meet him and stand by him in toil and in sweat of thy brow.
| courage |
Let Me Not Forget
If it is not my portion to meet thee in this life
then let me ever feel that I have missed thy sight
---let me not forget for a moment,
let me carry the pangs of this sorrow in my dreams
and in my wakeful hours.
As my days pass in the crowded market of this world
and my hands grow full with the daily profits,
let me ever feel that I have gained nothing
---let me not forget for a moment,
let me carry the pangs of this sorrow in my dreams
and in my wakeful hours.
When I sit by the roadside, tired and panting,
when I spread my bed low in the dust,
let me ever feel that the long journey is still before me
---let me not forget a moment,
let me carry the pangs of this sorrow in my dreams
and in my wakeful hours.
When my rooms have been decked out and the flutes sound
and the laughter there is loud,
let me ever feel that I have not invited thee to my house
---let me not forget for a moment,
let me carry the pangs of this sorrow in my dreams
and in my wakeful hours
| sad |
Light
Light, my light, the world-filling light,
the eye-kissing light,
heart-sweetening light!
Ah, the light dances, my darling, at the center of my life;
the light strikes, my darling, the chords of my love;
the sky opens, the wind runs wild, laughter passes over the earth.
The butterflies spread their sails on the sea of light.
Lilies and jasmines surge up on the crest of the waves of light.
The light is shattered into gold on every cloud, my darling,
and it scatters gems in profusion.
Mirth spreads from leaf to leaf, my darling,
and gladness without measure.
The heaven's river has drowned its banks
and the flood of joy is abroad. | joy |
Little Flute
Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure. This frail
vessel thou emptiest again and again, and fillest it ever with fresh life.
This little flute of a reed thou hast carried over hills and dales,
and hast breathed through it melodies eternally new.
At the immortal touch of thy hands my little heart loses its limits in
joy and gives birth to utterance ineffable.
Thy infinite gifts come to me only on these very small hands of mine.
Ages pass, and still thou pourest, and still there is room to fill.
| joy |
Little Of Me
Let only that little be left of me
whereby I may name thee my all.
Let only that little be left of my will
whereby I may feel thee on every side,
and come to thee in everything,
and offer to thee my love every moment.
Let only that little be left of me
whereby I may never hide thee.
Let only that little of my fetters be left
whereby I am bound with thy will,
and thy purpose is carried out in my life---and that is the fetter of thy love.
| love |
Lost Star
When the creation was new and all the stars shone in their first
splendor, the gods held their assembly in the sky and sang
`Oh, the picture of perfection! the joy unalloyed!'
But one cried of a sudden
---`It seems that somewhere there is a break in the chain of light
and one of the stars has been lost.'
The golden string of their harp snapped,
their song stopped, and they cried in dismay
---`Yes, that lost star was the best,
she was the glory of all heavens!'
From that day the search is unceasing for her,
and the cry goes on from one to the other
that in her the world has lost its one joy!
Only in the deepest silence of night the stars smile
and whisper among themselves
---`Vain is this seeking! unbroken perfection is over all!'
| peace |
Lost Time
On many an idle day have I grieved over lost time.
But it is never lost, my lord.
Thou hast taken every moment of my life in thine own hands.
Hidden in the heart of things thou art nourishing seeds into sprouts,
buds into blossoms, and ripening flowers into fruitfulness.
I was tired and sleeping on my idle bed
and imagined all work had ceased.
In the morning I woke up
and found my garden full with wonders of flowers. | joy |
Lotus
On the day when the lotus bloomed, alas, my mind was straying,
and I knew it not. My basket was empty and the flower remained unheeded.
Only now and again a sadness fell upon me, and I started up from my
dream and felt a sweet trace of a strange fragrance in the south wind.
That vague sweetness made my heart ache with longing and it seemed to
me that is was the eager breath of the summer seeking for its completion.
I knew not then that it was so near, that it was mine, and that this
perfect sweetness had blossomed in the depth of my own heart. | sad |
Lover's Gifts II: Come to My Garden Walk
Come to my garden walk, my love. Pass by the fervid flowers that
press themselves on your sight. Pass them by, stopping at some
chance joy, which like a sudden wonder of sunset illumines, yet
elude.
For lover's gift is shy, it never tells its name, it flits
across the shade, spreading a shiver of joy along the dust.
Overtake it or miss it for ever. But a gift that can be
grasped is merely a frail flower, or a lamp with flame that will
flicker. | love |
Lover's Gifts IV: She Is Near to My Heart
She is near to my heart as the meadow-flower to the earth; she is
sweet to me as sleep is to tired limbs. My love for her is my life
flowing in its fullness, like a river in autumn flood, running with
serene abandonment. My songs are one with my love, like the murmur
of a stream, that sings with all its waves and current.
| love |
Lover's Gifts LII: Tired of Waiting
Tired of waiting, you burst your bonds, impatient flowers, before
the winter had gone. Glimpses of the unseen comer reached your
wayside watch, and you rushed out running and panting, impulsive
jasmines, troops of riotous roses.
You were the first to march to the breach of death, your
clamour of colour and perfume troubled the air. You laughed and
pressed and pushed each other, bared your breast and dropped in
heaps.
The Summer will come in its time, sailing in the flood-tide
of the south wind. But you never counted slow moments to be sure
of him. You recklessly spent your all in the road, in the terrible
joy of faith.
You heard his footsteps from afar, and flung your mantle of
death for him to tread upon. Your bonds break even before the
rescuer is seen, you make him your own ere he can come and claim
you.
| love |
Lover's Gifts LIV: In the Beginning of Time
In the beginning of time, there rose from the churning of God's
dream two women. One is the dancer at the court of paradise, the
desired of men, she who laughs and plucks the minds of the wise
from their cold meditations and of fools from their emptiness; and
scatters them like seeds with careless hands in the extravagant
winds of March, in the flowering frenzy of May.
The other is the crowned queen of heaven, the mother, throned
on the fullness of golden autumn; she who in the harvest-time
brings straying hearts to the smile sweet as tears, the beauty deep
as the sea of silence, -brings them to the temple of the Unknown,
at the holy confluence of Life and Death.
| peace |
Lover's Gifts LVIII: Things Throng and Laugh
Things throng and laugh loud in the sky; the sands and dust dance
and whirl like children. Man's mind is aroused by their shouts; his
thoughts long to be the playmates of things.
Our dreams, drifting in the stream of the vague, stretch their
arms to clutch the earth, -their efforts stiffen into bricks and
stones, and thus the city of man is built.
Voices come swarming from the past,-seeking answers from the
living moments. Beats of their wings fill the air with tremulous
shadows, and sleepless thoughts in our minds leave their nests to
take flight across the desert of dimness, in the passionate thirst
for forms. They are lampless pilgrims, seeking the shore of light,
to find themselves in things. They will be lured into poets's
rhymes, they will be housed in the towers of the town not yet
planned, they have their call to arms from the battle fields of the
future, they are bidden to join hands in the strife of peace yet
to come. | joy |
Lover's Gifts LXX: Take Back Your Coins
Take back your coins, King's Councillor. I am of those women you
sent to the forest shrine to decoy the young ascetic who had never
seen a women. I failed in your bidding.
Dimly day was breaking when the hermit boy came to bathe in
the stream, his tawny locks crowded on his shoulders, like a
cluster of morning clouds, and his limbs shining like a streak of
sunbeam. We laughed and sang as we rowed in our boat; we jumped
into the river in a mad frolic, and danced around him, when the sun
rose staring at us from the water's edge in a flush of divine
anger.
Like a child-god, the boy opened his eyes and watched our
movements, the wonder deepening till his eyes shone like morning
stars. He lifted his clasped hands and chanted a hymn of praise in
his bird-like young voice, thrilling every leaf of the forest.
Never such words were sung to a mortal woman before; they were like
the silent hymn to the dawn which rises from the hushed hills. THe
women hid their mouths with their hands, their bodies swaying with
laughter, and a spasm of doubt ran across his face. Quickly came
I to his side, sorely pained, and, bowing to his feet, I said,
"Lord, accept my service."
I led him to the grassy bank, wiped his body with the end of
my silken mantle, and, kneeling on the ground, I dried his feet
with my trailing hair. When I raised my face and looked into his
eyes, I thought I felt the world's first kiss to the first woman,
-Blessed am I, blessed is God, who made me a woman. I heard him say
to me, "What God unknown are you? YOur touch is the touch of the
Immortal, your eyes have the mystery of the midnight."
Ah, no, not that smile, King's Councillor, -the dust of
worldly wisdom has covered your sight, old man. But this boy's
innocence pierced the mist and saw the shining truth, the woman
divine....
The women clapped their hands, and laughed their obscene
laugh, and with veils dragged on the dust and hair hanging loose
they began to pelt him with flowers.
Alas, my spotless sun, could not my shame weave fiery mist to
cover you in its folds? I fell at his feet and cried, "Forgive me.
" I fled like a stricken deer through shade and sun, and cried as
I fled, " Forgive me. " The women's foul laughter pressed me like
a cracking fire, but the words ever rang in my ears, " What God
unknown are you?" | sad |
Lover's Gifts V: I Would Ask For Still More
I would ask for still more, if I had the sky with all its stars,
and the world with its endless riches; but I would be content with
the smallest corner of this earth if only she were mine.
| love |
Lover's Gifts VIII: There Is Room for You
There is room for you. You are alone with your few sheaves of rice.
My boat is crowded, it is heavily laden, but how can I turn you
away? Your young body is slim and swaying; there is a twinkling
smile in the edge of your eyes, and your robe is coloured like the
rain cloud.
The travellers will land for different roads and homes. You
will sit for a while on the prow of my boat, and at the journey's
end none will keep you back.
Where do you go, and to what home, to garner your sheaves? I
will not question you, but when I fold my sails and moor my boat
I shall sit and wonder in the evening, -Where do you go, and to
what home, to garner your sheaves? | love |
Lover's Gifts XIII: Last Night in the Garden
Last night in the garden I offered you my youth's foaming wine. You
lifted the cup to your lips, you shut your eyes and smiled while
I raised your veil, unbound your tresses, drawing down upon my
breast your face sweet with its silence, last night when the moon's
dream overflowed the world of slumber.
To-day in the dew-cooled calm of the dawn you are walking to
God's temple, bathed and robed in white, with a basketful of
flowers in your hand. I stand aside in the shade under the tree,
with my head bent, in the calm of the dawn by the lonely road to
the temple. | love |
Lover's Gifts XIX: It Is Written in the Book
It is written in the book that Man, when fifty, must leave the
noisy world, to go to the forest seclusion. But the poet proclaims
that the forest hermitage is only for the young. For it is the
birthplace of flowers and the haunt of birds and bees; and hidden
hooks are waiting there for the thrill of lovers' whispers. There
the moon-light, that is all one kiss for the malati flowers, has
its deep message, but those who understand it are far below fifty.
And alas, youth is inexperienced and wilful, therefore it is
but meet that the old should take charge of the household, and the
young take to the seclusion of forest shades and the severe
discipline of courting.
| joy |
Lover's Gifts XL: A Message Came
A message came from my youth of vanished days, saying, " I wait for
you among the quivering of unborn May, where smiles ripen for tears
and hours ache with songs unsung."
It says, "Come to me across the worn-out track of age, through
the gates of death. For dreams fade, hopes fail, the fathered
fruits of the year decay, but I am the eternal truth, and you shall
meet me again and again in your voyage of life from shore to
shore." | sad |
Lover's Gifts XLII: Are You a Mere Picture
Are you a mere picture, and not as true as those stars, true as
this dust? They throb with the pulse of things, but you are
immensely aloof in your stillness, painted form.
The day was when you walked with me, your breath warm, your
limbs singing of life. My world found its speech in your voice, and
touched my heart with your face. You suddenly stopped in your walk,
in the shadow-side of the Forever, and I went on alone.
Life, like a child, laughs, shaking its rattle of death as it
runs; it beckons me on, I follow the unseen; but you stand there,
where you stopped behind that dust and those stars; and you are a
mere picture.
No, it cannot be. Had the life-flood utterly stopped in you,
it would stop the river in its flow, and the foot-fall of dawn in
her cadence of colours. Had the glimmering dusk of your hair
vanished in the hopeless dark, the woodland shade of summer would
die with its dreams.
Can it be true that I forgot you? We haste on without heed,
forgetting the flowers on the roadside hedge. Yet they breathe
unaware into our forgetfulness, filling it with music. You have
moved from my world, to take seat at the root of my life, and
therefore is this forgetting-remembrance lost in its own depth.
You are no longer before my songs, but one with them. You came
to me with the first ray of dawn. I lost you with the last gold of
evening. Ever since I am always finding you through the dark. No,
you are no mere picture.
| sad |
Lover's Gifts XLIII: Dying, You Have Left Behind
Dying, you have left behind you the great sadness of the Eternal
in my life. You have painted my thought's horizon with the sunset
colours of your departure, leaving a track of tears across the
earth to love's heaven. Clasped in your dear arms, life and death
united in me in a marriage bond.
I think I can see you watching there in the balcony with your
lamp lighted, where the end and the beginning of all things meet.
My world went hence through the doors that you opened-you holding
the cup of death to my lips, filling it with life from your own.
| sad |
Lover's Gifts XLIV: Where Is Heaven
Where is heaven? you ask me, my child,-the sages tell us it is
beyond the limits of birth and death, unswayed by the rhythm of day
and night; it is not of the earth.
But your poet knows that its eternal hunger is for time and
space, and it strives evermore to be born in the fruitful dust.
Heaven is fulfilled in your sweet body, my child, in your
palpitating heart.
The sea is beating its drums in joy, the flowers are a-tiptoe
to kiss you. For heaven is born in you, in the arms of the mother-
dust. | love |
Lover's Gifts XLVII: The Road Is
The road is my wedded companion. She speaks to me under my feet all
day, she sings to my dreams all night.
My meeting with her had no beginning, it begins endlessly at
each daybreak, renewing its summer in fresh flowers and songs, and
her every new kiss is the first kiss to me.
The road and I are lovers. I change my dress for her night
after night, leaving the tattered cumber of the old in the wayside
inns when the day dawns. | love |
Lover's Gifts XLVIII: I Travelled the Old Road
I travelled the old road every day, I took my fruits to the market,
my cattle to the meadows, I ferried my boat across the stream and
all the ways were well known to me.
One morning my basket was heavy with wares. Men were busy in
the fields, the pastures crowded with cattle; the breast of earth
heaved with the mirth of ripening rice.
Suddenly there was a tremor in the air, and the sky seemed to
kiss me on my forehead. My mind started up like the morning out of
mist.
I forgot to follow the track. I stepped a few paces from the
path, and my familiar world appeared strange to me, like a flower
I had only known in bud.
My everyday wisdom was ashamed. I went astray in the fairyland
of things. It was the best luck of my life that I lost my path that
morning, and found my eternal childhood. | joy |
Lover's Gifts XVI: She Dwelt Here by the Pool
She dwelt here by the pool with its landing-stairs in ruins. Many
an evening she had watched the moon made dizzy by the shaking of
bamboo leaves, and on many a rainy day the smell of the wet earth
had come to her over the young shoots of rice.
Her pet name is known here among those date-palm groves and
in the courtyards where girls sit and talk while stitching their
winter quilts. The water in this pool keeps in its depth the memory
of her swimming limbs, and her wet feet had left their marks, day
after day, on the footpath leading to the village.
The women who come to-day with their vessels to the water have
all seen her smile over simple jests, and the old peasant, taking
his bullocks to their bath, used to stop at her door every day to
greet her.
Many a sailing-boat passes by this village; many a traveller
takes rest beneath that banyan tree; the ferry-boat crosses to
yonder ford carrying crowds to the market; but they never notice
this spot by the village road, near the pool with its ruined
landing-stairs,-where dwelt she whom I love.
| love |
Lover's Gifts XVIII: Your Days
Your days will be full of cares, if you must give me your heart.
My house by the cross-roads has its doors open and my mind is
absent, -for I sing.
I shall never be made to answer for it, if you must give me
your heart. If I pledge my word to you in tunes now, and am too
much in earnest to keep it when music is silent, you must forgive
me; for the law laid down in May is best broken in December.
Do not always keep remembering it, if you must give me your
heart. When your eyes sing with love, and your voice ripples with
laughter, my answers to your questions will be wild, and not
miserly accurate in facts, -they are to be believed for ever and
then forgotten for good.
| love |
Lover's Gifts XXII: I Shall Gladly Suffer
I shall gladly suffer the pride of culture to die out in my house,
if only in some happy future I am born a herd-boy in the Brinda
forest.
The herd-boy who grazes his cattle sitting under the banyan
tree, and idly weaves gunja flowers into garlands, who loves to
splash and plunge in the Jamuna's cool deep stream.
He calls his companions to wake up when morning dawns, and all
the houses in the lane hum with the sound of the churn, clouds of
dust are raised by the cattle, the maidens come out in the
courtyard to milk the king.
As the shadows deepen under the tomal trees, and the dusk
gathers on the river-banks; when the milkmaids, while crossing the
turbulent water, tremble with fear; and loud peacocks, with tails
outspread, dance in the forest, he watchers the summer clouds.
When the April night is sweet as a fresh-blown flower, he
disappears in the forest with a peacock's plume in his hair; the
swing ropes are twined with flowers on the branches; the south wind
throbs with music, and the merry shepherd boys crowd on the banks
of the blue river.
No, I will never be the leader, brothers, of this new age of
new Bengal; I shall not trouble to light the lamp of culture for
the benighted. If only I could be born, under the shady asoka
groves, in some village of Brinda, where milk is churned by the
maidens!
| love |
Lover's Gifts XXVIII: I Dreamt
I dreamt that she sat by my head, tenderly ruffling my hair with
her fingers, playing the melody of her touch. I looked at her face
and struggled with my tears, till the agony of unspoken words burst
my sleep like a bubble.
I sat up and saw the glow of the Milky Way above my window,
like a world of silence on fire, and I wondered if at this moment
she had a dream that rhymed with mine. | sad |
Lover's Gifts XXXIX: There Is a Looker-On
things in ages and worlds beyond memory's shore, and those
forgotten sights glisten on the grass and shiver on the leaves. He
has seen under new veils the face of the one beloved, in twilight
hours of many a nameless star. Therefore his sky seems to ache with
the pain of countless meetings and partings, and a longing pervades
this spring breeze, -the longing that is full of the whisper of
ages without beginning. | sad |
Maya
That I should make much of myself and turn it on all sides,
thus casting colored shadows on thy radiance
---such is thy Maya.
Thou settest a barrier in thine own being
and then callest thy severed self in myriad notes.
This thy self-separation has taken body in me.
The poignant song is echoed through all the sky in many-coloued tears
and smiles, alarms and hopes; waves rise up and sink again,
dreams break and form.
In me is thy own defeat of self.
This screen that thou hast raised is painted with innumerable figures
with the brush of the night and the day.
Behind it thy seat is woven in wondrous mysteries of curves,
casting away all barren lines of straightness.
The great pageant of thee and me has overspread the sky.
With the tune of thee and me all the air is vibrant,
and all ages pass with the hiding and seeking of thee and me.
| love |
Moment's Indulgence
I ask for a moment's indulgence to sit by thy side. The works
that I have in hand I will finish afterwards.
Away from the sight of thy face my heart knows no rest nor respite,
and my work becomes an endless toil in a shoreless sea of toil.
Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove.
Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure
| love |
My Friend
Art thou abroad on this stormy night
on thy journey of love, my friend?
The sky groans like one in despair.
I have no sleep tonight.
Ever and again I open my door and look out on
the darkness, my friend!
I can see nothing before me.
I wonder where lies thy path!
By what dim shore of the ink-black river,
by what far edge of the frowning forest,
through what mazy depth of gloom art thou threading
thy course to come to me, my friend?
| sad |