Tribute to Rabindranath Tagore

Gift of love 2

 

I was not aware of the moment when I first crossed the threshold of this life. 

What was the power that made me open out into this vast mystery like a bud in the forest at midnight? 

When in the morning I looked upon the light I felt in a moment that I was no stranger in this world, 

that the inscrutable without name and form had taken me in its arms in the form of my own mother. 

Even so, in death the same unknown will appear as ever known to me. 

And because I love this life, I know I shall love death as well. 

The child cries out when from the right breast the mother takes it away 

to find in the very next moment its consolation in the left one.

***

Thou art the sky and thou art the nest as well. 

Oh, thou beautiful, there in the nest it is thy love that encloses the soul with colors and sounds and odors. 

There comes the morning with the golden basket in her right hand bearing the wreath of beauty, silently to crown the earth. 

And there comes the evening over the lonely meadows deserted by herds, through trackless paths, carrying cool draughts of peace in her golden pitcher from the western ocean of rest.

But there, where spreads the infinite sky for the soul to take her flight in, reigns the stainless white radiance. 

There is no day nor night, nor form nor color, and never never a word.

***

Keep me fully glad with nothing. 

Only take my hand in your hand.

In the gloom of the deepening night take up my heart and play with it as you list. 

Bind me close to you with nothing.

I will spread myself out at your feet and lie still. 

Under this clouded sky I will meet silence with silence. 

I will become one with the night clasping the earth in my breast.

Make my life glad with nothing.        

The rains sweep the sky from end to end. 

Jasmines in the wet untamable wind revel in their own perfume. 

The cloud-hidden stars thrill in secret. 

Let me fill to the full of my heart with nothing but my own depth of joy.

***

The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.

It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth in numberless blades of grass and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.

It is Your same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth and of death, in ebb and in flow.

I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life. 

And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.

***

Senses

Deliverance is not for me in renunciation. 

I feel the embrace of freedom in a thousand bonds of delight.

You ever pour for me the fresh draught of Your wine of various colors and fragrance, filling this earthen vessel to the brim.

My world will light its hundred different lamps with Your flame and place them before the altar of Your temple.

No, I will never shut the doors of my senses. 

The delights of sight and hearing and touch will bear Your delight.

Yes, all my illusions will burn into illumination of joy, and all my desires ripen into fruits of love.

***

The Journey

The morning sea of silence broke into ripples of bird songs; 

and the flowers were all merry by the roadside; 

and the wealth of gold was scattered through the rift of the clouds 

while we busily went on our way and paid no heed. 

We sang no glad songs nor played; 

we went not to the village for barter; 

we spoke not a word nor smiled; 

we lingered not on the way. 

We quickened our pace more and more as the time sped by. 

The sun rose to the mid sky and doves cooed in the shade. 

Withered leaves danced and whirled in the hot air of noon. 

The shepherd boy drowsed and dreamed in the shadow of the banyan tree, 

and I laid myself down by the water 

and stretched my tired limbs on the grass. 

My companions laughed at me in scorn; 

they held their heads high and hurried on; 

they never looked back nor rested; 

they vanished in the distant blue haze. 

They crossed many meadows and hills, 

and passed through strange, far-away countries. 

All honor to you, heroic host of the interminable path! 

Mockery and reproach pricked me to rise, 

but found no response in me. 

I gave myself up for lost 

in the depth of a glad humiliation 

---in the shadow of a dim delight. 

The repose of the sun-embroidered green gloom 

slowly spread over my heart. 

I forgot for what I had traveled, 

and I surrendered my mind without struggle 

to the maze of shadows and songs. 

At last, when I woke from my slumber and opened my eyes, 

I saw thee standing by me, flooding my sleep with thy smile. 

How I had feared that the path was long and wearisome, 

and the struggle to reach thee was hard!

***

Let all the strains of joy 

mingle in my last song -- 

the joy that makes the earth flow over 

in the riotous excess of the grass, 

the joy that sets the twin brothers, 

life and death, dancing over the wide world, 

the joy that sweeps in with the tempest, 

shaking and waking all life with laughter, 

the joy that sits still with its tears 

on the open red lotus of pain, 

and the joy that throws everything it has 

upon the dust, and knows not a word.

***

Yes, I know, this is nothing but thy love,

O beloved of my heart --

this golden light that dances upon the leaves, 

these idle clouds sailing across the sky, 

this passing breeze leaving 

its coolness upon my forehead.

The morning light has flooded my eyes --

this is thy message to my heart.

Thy face is bent from above, 

thy eyes look down on my eyes, 

and my heart has touched thy feet.

***

Is it beyond thee to be glad with the gladness of this rhythm? 

to be tossed and lost and broken in the whirl of this fearful joy?

All things rush on, they stop not, they look not behind, no power can hold them back, they rush on.

Keeping steps with that restless, rapid music, seasons come dancing and pass away—colours, tunes, and perfumes pour in endless cascades in the abounding joy that scatters and gives up and dies every moment.

***

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. 

***

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. 

***

Ocean of Forms 

I dive down into the depth of the ocean of forms,

hoping to gain the perfect pearl of the formless. 

No more sailing from harbor to harbor with this my weather-beaten boat.

The days are long passed when my sport was to be tossed on waves. 

And now I am eager to die into the deathless. 

Into the audience hall by the fathomless abyss

where swells up the music of toneless strings

I shall take this harp of my life. 

I shall tune it to the notes of forever,

and when it has sobbed out its last utterance,

lay down my silent harp at the feet of the silent. 

***

Sit Smiling 

I boasted among men that I had known you.

They see your pictures in all works of mine.

They come and ask me, `Who is he?'

I know not how to answer them. I say, `Indeed, I cannot tell.'

They blame me and they go away in scorn.

And you sit there smiling. 

I put my tales of you into lasting songs.

The secret gushes out from my heart.

They come and ask me, `Tell me all your meanings.'

I know not how to answer them.

I say, `Ah, who knows what they mean!'

They smile and go away in utter scorn.

And you sit there smiling. 

***

Mind Without Fear 

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; 

Where knowledge is free; 

Where the world has not been broken up

into fragments by narrow domestic walls; 

Where words come out from the depth of truth; 

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection; 

Where the clear stream of reason

has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit; 

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action--- 

Into that

 heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. 

***

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!' 

***

Who is This? 

I came out alone on my way to my tryst.

But who is this that follows me in the silent dark? 

I move aside to avoid his presence but I escape him not. 

He makes the dust rise from the earth with his swagger;

he adds his loud voice to every word that I utter. 

He is my own little self, my lord, he knows no shame;

but I am ashamed to come to thy door in his company.