18
The night deepens and the dying flame flickers in the lamp.
The night deepens and the dying flame flickers in the lamp.
Tagore - Creative Unity
Day after day, in
raising your head, in a glance, in the motion of your hands, your love
spoke as the sea speaks through its waves. On a sudden my voice would send
your heart quivering through your limbs--have I never witnessed it? I know
you, and therefore you are my captive for ever. The very king of your Gods
shall not sever this bond.
KACHA
Was it for this, Devayani, that I toiled, away from home and kindred, all
these years?
DEVAYANI
Why not? Is only knowledge precious? Is love cheap? Lay hold on this
moment. Have the courage to own that a woman's heart is worth all as much
penance as men undergo for the sake of power, knowledge, or reputation.
KACHA
I gave my solemn promise to the Gods that I would bring them this lore of
deathless life.
DEVAYANI
But is it true you had eyes for nothing save your books? That you never
broke off your studies to pay me homage with flowers, never lay in wait for
a chance, of an evening, to help me water my flower-beds? What made you sit
by me on the grass and sing songs you brought hither from the assembly of
the stars, while darkness stooped over the river bank as love droops over
its own sad silence? Were these parts of a cruel conspiracy plotted in your
Paradise? Was all for the sake of access to my father's heart? --and after
success, were you, departing, to throw some cheap gratitude, like small
coins, to the deluded door-keeper?
KACHA
What profit were there, proud woman, in knowing the truth? If I did wrong
to serve you with a passionate devotion cherished in secret, I have had
ample punishment. This is no time to question whether my love be true or
not; my life's work awaits me. Though my heart must henceforth enclose a
red flame vainly striving to devour emptiness, still I must go back to that
Paradise which will nevermore be Paradise to me. I owe the Gods a new
divinity, hard won by my studies, before I may think of happiness. Forgive
me, Devayani, and know that my suffering is doubled by the pain I
unwillingly inflict on you.
DEVAYANI
Forgiveness! You have angered my heart till it is hard and burning like a
thunderbolt! You can go back to your work and your glory, but what is left
for me? Memory is a bed of thorns, and secret shame will gnaw at the roots
of my life. You came like a wayfarer, sat through the sunny hours in the
shade of my garden, and to while time away you plucked all its flowers and
wove them into a chain. And now, parting, you snap the thread and let the
flowers drop on the dust! Accursed be that great knowledge you have
earned! --a burden that, though others share equally with you, will never be
lightened. For lack of love may it ever remain as foreign to your life as
the cold stars are to the un-espoused darkness of virgin Night!
21
I
"Why these preparations without end? "--I said to Mind--"Is some one to
come? "
Mind replied, "I am enormously busy gathering things and building towers. I
have no time to answer such questions. "
Meekly I went back to my work.
When things were grown to a pile, when seven wings of his palace were
complete, I said to Mind, "Is it not enough? "
Mind began to say, "Not enough to contain--" and then stopped.
"Contain what? " I asked.
Mind affected not to hear.
I suspected that Mind did not know, and with ceaseless work smothered the
question.
His one refrain was, "I must have more. "
"Why must you? "
"Because it is great. "
"What is great? "
Mind remained silent. I pressed for an answer.
In contempt and anger, Mind said, "Why ask about things that are not? Take
notice of those that are hugely before you,--the struggle and the fight,
the army and armaments, the bricks and mortar, and labourers without
number. "
I thought "Possibly Mind is wise. "
II
Days passed. More wings were added to his palace--more lands to his domain.
The season of rains came to an end. The dark clouds became white and thin,
and in the rain-washed sky the sunny hours hovered like butterflies over an
unseen flower. I was bewildered and asked everybody I met, "What is that
music in the breeze? "
A tramp walked the road whose dress was wild as his manner; he said, "Hark
to the music of the Coming! "
I cannot tell why I was convinced, but the words broke from me, "We have
not much longer to wait. "
"It is close at hand," said the mad man.
I went to the office and boldly said to Mind, "Stop all work! "
Mind asked, "Have you any news? "
"Yes," I answered, "News of the Coming. " But I could not explain.
Mind shook his head and said, "There are neither banners nor pageantry! "
III
The night waned, the stars paled in the sky. Suddenly the touchstone of the
morning light tinged everything with gold. A cry spread from mouth to
mouth--
"Here is the herald! "
I bowed my head and asked, "Is he coming? "
The answer seemed to burst from all sides, "Yes. "
Mind grew troubled and said, "The dome of my building is not yet finished,
nothing is in order. "
A voice came from the sky, "Pull down your building! "
"But why? " asked Mind.
"Because to-day is the day of the Coming, and your building is in the way. "
IV
The lofty building lies in the dust and all is scattered and broken.
Mind looked about. But what was there to see?
Only the morning star and the lily washed in dew.
And what else? A child running laughing from its mother's arms into the
open light.
"Was it only for this that they said it was the day of the Coming? "
"Yes, this was why they said there was music in the air and light in the
sky. "
"And did they claim all the earth only for this? "
"Yes," came the answer. "Mind, you build walls to imprison yourself. Your
servants toil to enslave themselves; but the whole earth and infinite space
are for the child, for the New Life. "
"What does that child bring you? "
"Hope for all the world and its joy. "
Mind asked me, "Poet, do you understand? "
"I lay my work aside," I said, "for I must have time to understand. "
22
TRANSLATIONS
VAISHNAVA SONGS
1
Oh Sakhi,[1] my sorrow knows no bounds.
[Footnote 1: The woman friend of a woman. ]
August comes laden with rain clouds and my house is desolate.
The stormy sky growls, the earth is flooded with rain, my love is far away,
and my heart is torn with anguish.
The peacocks dance, for the clouds rumble and frogs croak.
The night brims with darkness flicked with lightning.
Vidyapati[2] asks, "Maiden, how are you to spend your days and nights
without your lord? "
[Footnote 2: The name of the poet. ]
2
Lucky was my awakening this morning, for I saw my beloved.
The sky was one piece of joy, and my life and youth were fulfilled.
To-day my house becomes my house in truth, and my body my body.
Fortune has proved a friend, and my doubts are dispelled.
Birds, sing your best; moon, shed your fairest light!
Let fly your darts, Love-God, in millions!
I wait for the moment when my body will grow golden at his touch.
Vidyapati says, "Immense is your good fortune, and blessed is your love. "
3
I feel my body vanishing into the dust whereon my beloved walks.
I feel one with the water of the lake where he bathes.
Oh Sakhi, my love crosses death's boundary when I meet him.
My heart melts in the light and merges in the mirror whereby he views his
face.
I move with the air to kiss him when he waves his fan, and wherever he
wanders I enclose him like the sky.
Govindadas says, "You are the gold-setting, fair maiden, he is the
emerald. "
4
My love, I will keep you hidden in my eyes; I will thread your image like a
gem on my joy and hang it on my bosom.
You have been in my heart ever since I was a child, throughout my youth,
throughout my life, even through all my dreams.
You dwell in my being when I sleep and when I wake.
Know that I am a woman, and bear with me when you find me wanting.
For I have thought and thought and know for certain that all that is left
for me in this world is your love, and if I lose you for a moment I die.
Chandidas says, "Be tender to her who is yours in life and death. "
5
"Fruit to sell, Fruit to sell," cried the woman at the door.
The Child came out of the house.
"Give me some fruit," said he, putting a handful of rice in her basket.
The fruit-seller gazed at his face and her eyes swam with tears.
"Who is the fortunate mother," she cried, "that has clasped you in her arms
and fed you at her breast, and whom your dear voice called 'Mother'? "
"Offer your fruit to him," says the poet, "and with it your life. "
II
1
Endlessly varied art thou in the exuberant world, Lady of Manifold
Magnificence. Thy path is strewn with lights, thy touch thrills into
flowers; that trailing skirt of thine sweeps the whirl of a dance among the
stars, and thy many-toned music is echoed from innumerable worlds through
signs and colours.
Single and alone in the unfathomed stillness of the soul, art thou, Lady of
Silence and Solitude, a vision thrilled with light, a lonely lotus
blossoming on the stem of love.
2
Behind the rusty iron gratings of the opposite window sits a girl, dark and
plain of face, like a boat stranded on a sand-bank when the river is
shallow in the summer.
I come back to my room after my day's work, and my tired eyes are lured to
her.
She seems to me like a lake with its dark lonely waters edged by moonlight.
She has only her window for freedom: there the morning light meets her
musings, and through it her dark eyes like lost stars travel back to their
sky.
3
I remember the day.
The heavy shower of rain is slackening into fitful pauses, renewed gusts of
wind startle it from a first lull.
I take up my instrument. Idly I touch the strings, till, without my
knowing, the music borrows the mad cadence of that storm.
I see her figure as she steals from her work, stops at my door, and
retreats with hesitating steps. She comes again, stands outside leaning
against the wall, then slowly enters the room and sits down. With head
bent, she plies her needle in silence; but soon stops her work, and looks
out of the window through the rain at the blurred line of trees.
Only this--one hour of a rainy noon filled with shadows and song and
silence.
4
While stepping into the carriage she turned her head and threw me a swift
glance of farewell.
This was her last gift to me. But where can I keep it safe from the
trampling hours?
Must evening sweep this gleam of anguish away, as it will the last flicker
of fire from the sunset?
Ought it to be washed off by the rain, as treasured pollens are from
heart-broken flowers?
Leave kingly glory and the wealth of the rich to death. But may not tears
keep ever fresh the memory of a glance flung through a passionate moment?
"Give it to me to keep," said my song; "I never touch kings' glory or the
wealth of the rich, but these small things are mine for ever. "
5
You give yourself to me, like a flower that blossoms at night, whose
presence is known by the dew that drips from it, by the odour shed through
the darkness, as the first steps of Spring are by the buds that thicken the
twigs.
You break upon my thought like waves at the high tide, and my heart is
drowned under surging songs.
My heart knew of your coming, as the night feels the approach of dawn. The
clouds are aflame and my sky fills with a great revealing flood.
6
I was to go away; still she did not speak. But I felt, from a slight
quiver, her yearning arms would say: "Ah no, not yet. "
I have often heard her pleading hands vocal in a touch, though they knew
not what they said.
I have known those arms to stammer when, had they not, they would have
become youth's garland round my neck.
Their little gestures return to remembrance in the covert of still hours,
like truants they playfully reveal things she had kept secret from me.
7
My songs are like bees; they follow through the air some fragrant
trace--some memory--of you, to hum around your shyness, eager for its
hidden store.
When the freshness of dawn droops in the sun, when in the noon the air
hangs low with heaviness and the forest is silent, my songs return home,
their languid wings dusted with gold.
8
I believe you had visited me in a vision before we ever met, like some
foretaste of April before the spring broke into flower.
That vision must have come when all was bathed in the odour of _sal_
blossom; when the twilight twinkle of the river fringed its yellow sands,
and the vague sounds of a summer afternoon were blended; yes, and had it
not laughed and evaded me in many a nameless gleam at other moments?
9
I think I shall stop startled if ever we meet after our next birth, walking
in the light of a far-away world.
I shall know those dark eyes then as morning stars, and yet feel that they
have belonged to some unremembered evening sky of a former life.
I shall know that the magic of your face is not all its own, but has stolen
the passionate light that was in my eyes at some immemorial meeting, and
then gathered from my love a mystery that has now forgotten its origin.
10
Lay down your lute, my love, leave your arms free to embrace me.
Let your touch bring my overflowing heart to my body's utmost brink.
Do not bend your neck and turn away your face, but offer up a kiss to me,
which has been like some perfume long closed in a bud.
Do not smother this moment under vain words, but let our hearts quake in a
rush of silence sweeping all thoughts to the shoreless delight.
11
You have made me great with your love, though I am but one among the many,
drifting in the common tide, rocking in the fluctuant favour of the world.
You have given me a seat where poets of all time bring their tribute, and
lovers with deathless names greet one another across the ages.
Men hastily pass me in the market,--never noting how my body has grown
precious with your caress, how I carry your kiss within, as the sun carries
in its orb the fire of the divine touch and shines for ever.
12
Like a child that frets and pushes away its toys, my heart to-day shakes
its head at every phrase I suggest, and says, "No, not this. "
Yet words, in the agony of their vagueness, haunt my mind, like vagrant
clouds hovering over hills, waiting for some chance wind to relieve them of
their rain.
But leave these vain efforts, my soul, for the stillness will ripen its own
music in the dark.
My life to-day is like a cloister during some penance, where the spring is
afraid to stir or to whisper.
This is not the time, my love, for you to pass the gate; at the mere
thought of your anklet bells tinkling down the path, the garden echoes are
ashamed.
Know that to-morrow's songs are in bud to-day, and should they see you walk
by they would strain to breaking their immature hearts.
13
Whence do you bring this disquiet, my love?
Let my heart touch yours and kiss the pain out of your silence.
The night has thrown up from its depth this little hour, that love may
build a new world within these shut doors, to be lighted by this solitary
lamp.
We have for music but a single reed which our two pairs of lips must play
on by turns--for crown, only one garland to bind my hair after I have put
it on your forehead.
Tearing the veil from my breast I shall make our bed on the floor; and one
kiss and one sleep of delight shall fill our small boundless world.
14
All that I had I gave to you, keeping but the barest veil of reserve.
It is so thin that you secretly smile at it and I feel ashamed.
The gust of the spring breeze sweeps it away unawares, and the flutter of
my own heart moves it as the waves move their foam.
My love, do not grieve if I keep this flimsy mist of distance round me.
This frail reserve of mine is no mere woman's coyness, but a slender stem
on which the flower of my self-surrender bends towards you with reticent
grace.
15
I have donned this new robe to-day because my body feels like singing.
It is not enough that I am given to my love once and for ever, but out of
that I must fashion new gifts every day; and shall I not seem a fresh
offering, dressed in a new robe?
My heart, like the evening sky, has its endless passion for colour, and
therefore I change my veils, which have now the green of the cool young
grass and now that of the winter rice.
To-day my robe is tinted with the rain-rimmed blue of the sky. It brings to
my limbs the colour of the boundless, the colour of the oversea hills; and
it carries in its folds the delight of summer clouds flying in the wind.
16
I thought I would write love's words in their own colour; but that lies
deep in the heart, and tears are pale.
Would you know them, friend, if the words were colourless?
I thought I would sing love's words to their own tune, but that sounds only
in my heart, and my eyes are silent.
Would you know them, friend, if there were no tune?
17
In the night the song came to me; but you were not there.
It found the words for which I had been seeking all day. Yes, in the
stillness a moment after dark they throbbed into music, even as the stars
then began to pulse with light; but you were not there. My hope was to sing
it to you in the morning; but, try as I might, though the music came, the
words hung back, when you were beside me.
18
The night deepens and the dying flame flickers in the lamp.
I forgot to notice when the evening--like a village girl who has filled her
pitcher at the river a last time for that day--closed the door on her
cabin.
I was speaking to you, my love, with mind barely conscious of my
voice--tell me, had it any meaning? Did it bring you any message from
beyond life's borders?
For now, since my voice has ceased, I feel the night throbbing with
thoughts that gaze in awe at the abyss of their dumbness.
19
When we two first met my heart rang out in music, "She who is eternally
afar is beside you for ever. "
That music is silent, because I have grown to believe that my love is only
near, and have forgotten that she is also far, far away.
Music fills the infinite between two souls. This has been muffled by the
mist of our daily habits.
On shy summer nights, when the breeze brings a vast murmur out of the
silence, I sit up in my bed and mourn the great loss of her who is beside
me. I ask myself, "When shall I have another chance to whisper to her words
with the rhythm of eternity in them? "
Wake up, my song, from thy languor, rend this screen of the familiar, and
fly to my beloved there, in the endless surprise of our first meeting!
20
Lovers come to you, my Queen, and proudly lay their riches at your feet:
but my tribute is made up of unfulfilled hopes.
Shadows have stolen across the heart of my world and the best in me has
lost light.
While the fortunate laugh at my penury, I ask you to lend my failings your
tears, and so make them precious.
I bring you a voiceless instrument.
I strained to reach a note which was too high in my heart, and the string
broke.
While masters laugh at the snapped cord, I ask you to take my lute in your
hands and fill its hollowness with your songs.
21
The father came back from the funeral rites.
His boy of seven stood at the window, with eyes wide open and a golden
amulet hanging from his neck, full of thoughts too difficult for his age.
His father took him in his arms and the boy asked him, "Where is mother? "
"In heaven," answered his father, pointing to the sky.
At night the father groaned in slumber, weary with grief.
A lamp dimly burned near the bedroom door, and a lizard chased moths on the
wall.
The boy woke up from sleep, felt with his hands the emptiness in the bed,
and stole out to the open terrace.
The boy raised his eyes to the sky and long gazed in silence. His
bewildered mind sent abroad into the night the question, "Where is heaven? "
No answer came: and the stars seemed like the burning tears of that
ignorant darkness.
22
She went away when the night was about to wane.
My mind tried to console me by saying, "All is vanity. "
I felt angry and said, "That unopened letter with her name on it, and this
palm-leaf fan bordered with red silk by her own hands, are they not real? "
The day passed, and my friend came and said to me, "Whatever is good is
true, and can never perish. "
"How do you know? " I asked impatiently; "was not this body good which is
now lost to the world? "
As a fretful child hurting its own mother, I tried to wreck all the
shelters that ever I had, in and about me, and cried, "This world is
treacherous. "
Suddenly I felt a voice saying--"Ungrateful! "
I looked out of the window, and a reproach seemed to come from the
star-sprinkled night,--"You pour out into the void of my absence your faith
in the truth that I came! "
23
The river is grey and the air dazed with blown sand.
On a morning of dark disquiet, when the birds are mute and their nests
shake in the gust, I sit alone and ask myself, "Where is she? "
The days have flown wherein we sat too near each other; we laughed and
jested, and the awe of love's majesty found no words at our meetings.
I made myself small, and she trifled away every moment with pelting talk.
To-day I wish in vain that she were by me, in the gloom of the coming
storm, to sit in the soul's solitude.
24
The name she called me by, like a flourishing jasmine, covered the whole
seventeen years of our love. With its sound mingled the quiver of the light
through the leaves, the scent of the grass in the rainy night, and the sad
silence of the last hour of many an idle day.
Not the work of God alone was he who answered to that name; she created him
again for herself during those seventeen swift years.
Other years were to follow, but their vagrant days, no longer gathered
within the fold of that name uttered in her voice, stray and are scattered.
They ask me, "Who should fold us? "
I find no answer and sit silent, and they cry to me while dispersing, "We
seek a shepherdess! "
Whom should they seek?
That they do not know. And like derelict evening clouds they drift in the
trackless dark, and are lost and forgotten.
25
I feel that your brief days of love have not been left behind in those
scanty years of your life.
I seek to know in what place, away from the slow-thieving dust, you keep
them now. I find in my solitude some song of your evening that died, yet
left a deathless echo; and the sighs of your unsatisfied hours I find
nestled in the warm quiet of the autumn noon.
Your desires come from the hive of the past to haunt my heart, and I sit
still to listen to their wings.
26
You have taken a bath in the dark sea. You are once again veiled in a
bride's robe, and through death's arch you come back to repeat our wedding
in the soul.
Neither lute nor drum is struck, no crowd has gathered, not a wreath is
hung on the gate.
Your unuttered words meet mine in a ritual unillumined by lamps.
27
I was walking along a path overgrown with grass, when suddenly I heard from
some one behind, "See if you know me? "
I turned round and looked at her and said, "I cannot remember your name. "
She said, "I am that first great Sorrow whom you met when you were young. "
Her eyes looked like a morning whose dew is still in the air.
I stood silent for some time till I said, "Have you lost all the great
burden of your tears? "
She smiled and said nothing. I felt that her tears had had time to learn
the language of smiles.
"Once you said," she whispered, "that you would cherish your grief for
ever. "
I blushed and said, "Yes, but years have passed and I forget. "
Then I took her hand in mine and said, "But you have changed. "
"What was sorrow once has now become peace," she said.
28
Our life sails on the uncrossed sea whose waves chase each other in an
eternal hide-and-seek.
It is the restless sea of change, feeding its foaming flocks to lose them
over and over again, beating its hands against the calm of the sky.
Love, in the centre of this circling war-dance of light and dark, yours is
that green island, where the sun kisses the shy forest shade and silence is
wooed by birds' singing.
29
AMA AND VINAYAKA
AMA AND VINAYAKA
_Night on the battlefield:_ AMA _meets her father_ VINAYAKA.
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Shameless wanton, you call me "Father"! you who did not shrink from a
Mussulman husband!
AMA
Though you have treacherously killed my husband, yet you are my father; and
I hold back a widow's tears, lest they bring God's curse on you. Since we
have met on this battlefield after years of separation, let me bow to your
feet and take my last leave!
VINAYAKA
Where will you go, Ama? The tree on which you built your impious nest is
hewn down. Where will _you_ take shelter?
AMA
I have my son.
VINAYAKA
Leave him! Cast never a fond look back on the result of a sin expiated with
blood! Think where to go.
AMA
Death's open gates are wider than a father's love!
VINAYAKA
Death indeed swallows sins as the sea swallows the mud of rivers. But you
are to die neither to-night nor here. Seek some solitary shrine of holy
Shiva far from shamed kindred and all neighbours; bathe three times a day
in sacred Ganges, and, while reciting God's name, listen to the last bell
of evening worship, that Death may look tenderly upon you, as a father on
his sleeping child whose eyes are still wet with tears. Let him gently
carry you into his own great silence, as the Ganges carries a fallen flower
on its stream, washing every stain away to render it, a fit offering, to
the sea.
AMA
But my son----
VINAYAKA
Again I bid you not to speak of him. Lay yourself once more in a father's
arms, my child, like a babe fresh from the womb of Oblivion, your second
mother.
AMA
To me the world has become a shadow. Your words I hear, but cannot take to
heart. Leave me, father, leave me alone! Do not try to bind me with your
love, for its bands are red with my husband's blood.
VINAYAKA
Alas! no flower ever returns to the parent branch it dropped from. How can
you call him _husband_ who forcibly snatched you from Jivaji to whom you
had been sacredly affianced? I shall never forget that night! In the
wedding hall we sat anxiously expecting the bridegroom, for the auspicious
hour was dwindling away. Then in the distance appeared the glare of
torches, and bridal strains came floating up the air. We shouted for joy:
women blew their conch-shells. A procession of palanquins entered the
courtyard: but while we were asking, "Where is Jivaji? " armed men burst out
of the litters like a storm, and bore you off before we knew what had
happened. Shortly after, Jivaji came to tell us he had been waylaid and
captured by a Mussulman noble of the Vijapur court. That night Jivaji and I
touched the nuptial fire and swore bloody death to this villain. After
waiting long, we have been freed from our solemn pledge to-night; and the
spirit of Jivaji, who lost his life in this battle, lawfully claims you for
wife.
AMA
Father, it may be that I have disgraced the rites of your house, but my
honour is unsullied; I loved him to whom I bore a son. I remember the night
when I received two secret messages, one from you, one from my mother;
yours said: "I send you the knife; kill him! " My mother's: "I send you the
poison; end your life! " Had unholy force dishonoured me, your double
bidding had been obeyed. But my body was yielded only after love had given
_me_--love all the greater, all the purer, in that it overcame the
hereditary recoil of our blood from the Mussulman.
_Enter_ RAMA, AMA'S _mother_
AMA
Mother mine, I had not hoped to see you again. Let me take dust from your
feet.
RAMA
Touch me not with impure hands!
AMA
I am as pure as yourself.
RAMA
To whom have you surrendered your honour?
AMA
To my husband.
RAMA
Husband? A Mussulman the husband of a Brahmin woman?
AMA
I do not merit contempt: I am proud to say I never despised my husband
though a Mussulman. If Paradise will reward your devotion to your husband,
then the same Paradise waits for your daughter, who has been as true a
wife.
RAMA
Are you indeed a true wife?
AMA
Yes.
RAMA
Do you know how to die without flinching?
AMA
I do.
RAMA
Then let the funeral fire be lighted for you! See, there lies the body of
your husband.
AMA
Jivaji?
RAMA
Yes, Jivaji. He was your husband by plighted troth. The baffled fire of the
nuptial God has raged into the hungry fire of death, and the interrupted
wedding shall be completed now.
VINAYAKA
Do not listen, my child. Go back to your son, to your own nest darkened
with sorrow. My duty has been performed to its extreme cruel end, and
nothing now remains for you to do. --Wife, your grief is fruitless. Were the
branch dead which was violently snapped from our tree, I should give it to
the fire. But it has sent living roots into a new soil and is bearing
flowers and fruits. Allow her, without regret, to obey the laws of those
among whom she has loved. Come, wife, it is time we cut all worldly ties
and spent our remainder lives in the seclusion of some peaceful pilgrim
shrine.
RAMA
I am ready: but first must tread into dust every sprout of sin and shame
that has sprung from the soil of our life. A daughter's infamy stains her
mother's honour. That black shame shall feed glowing fire to-night, and
raise a true wife's memorial over the ashes of my daughter.
AMA
Mother, if by force you unite me in death with one who was not my husband,
then will you bring a curse upon yourself for desecrating the shrine of the
Eternal Lord of Death.
RAMA
Soldiers, light the fire; surround the woman!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Do not fear. Alas, my child, that you should ever have to call your father
to save you from your mother's hands!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Come to me, my darling child! Mere vanity are these man-made laws,
splashing like spray against the rock of heaven's ordinance. Bring your son
to me, and we will live together, my daughter. A father's love, like God's
rain, does not judge but is poured forth from an abounding source.
RAMA
Where would you go? Turn back! --Soldiers, stand firm in your loyalty to
your master Jivaji! do your last sacred duty by him!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Free her, soldiers! She is my daughter.
SOLDIERS
She is the widow of our master.
VINAYAKA
Her husband, though a Mussulman, was staunch in his own faith.
RAMA
Soldiers, keep this old man under control!
AMA
I defy you, mother! --You, soldiers, I defy! --for through death and love I
win to freedom.
30
A painter was selling pictures at the fair; followed by servants, there
passed the son of a minister who in youth had cheated this painter's father
so that he had died of a broken heart.
The boy lingered before the pictures and chose one for himself. The painter
flung a cloth over it and said he would not sell it.
After this the boy pined heart-sick till his father came and offered a
large price. But the painter kept the picture unsold on his shop-wall and
grimly sat before it, saying to himself, "This is my revenge. "
The sole form this painter's worship took was to trace an image of his god
every morning.
And now he felt these pictures grow daily more different from those he used
to paint.
This troubled him, and he sought in vain for an explanation till one day he
started up from work in horror, the eyes of the god he had just drawn were
those of the minister, and so were the lips.
He tore up the picture, crying, "My revenge has returned on my head! "
31
The General came before the silent and angry King and saluting him said:
"The village is punished, the men are stricken to dust, and the women cower
in their unlit homes afraid to weep aloud. "
The High Priest stood up and blessed the King and cried: "God's mercy is
ever upon you. "
The Clown, when he heard this, burst out laughing and startled the court.
The King's frown darkened.
"The honour of the throne," said the minister, "is upheld by the King's
prowess and the blessing of Almighty God. "
Louder laughed the Clown, and the King growled,--"Unseemly mirth! "
"God has showered many blessings upon your head," said the Clown; "the one
he bestowed on me was the gift of laughter. "
"This gift will cost you your life," said the King, gripping his sword with
his right hand.
Yet the Clown stood up and laughed till he laughed no more.
A shadow of dread fell upon the Court, for they heard that laughter echoing
in the depth of God's silence.
32
THE MOTHER'S PRAYER
THE MOTHER'S PRAYER
_Prince Duryodhana, the son of the blind Kaurava King Dhritarashtra, and of
Queen Gandhari, has played with his cousins the Pandava Kings for their
kingdom, and won it by fraud. _
DHRITARASHTRA
You have compassed your end.
DURYODHANA
Success is mine!
DHRITARASHTRA
Are you happy?
DURYODHANA
I am victorious.
DHRITARASHTRA
I ask you again, what happiness have you in winning the undivided kingdom?
DURYODHANA
Sire, a Kshatriya thirsts not after happiness but victory, that fiery wine
pressed from seething jealousy. Wretchedly happy we were, like those
inglorious stains that lie idly on the breast of the moon, when we lived in
peace under the friendly dominance of our cousins. Then these Pandavas
milked the world of its wealth, and allowed us a share, in brotherly
tolerance. Now that they own defeat and expect banishment, I am no longer
happy but exultant.
DHRITARASHTRA
Wretch, you forget that both Pandavas and Kauravas have the same
forefathers.
DURYODHANA
It was difficult to forget that, and therefore our inequalities rankled in
my heart. At midnight the moon is never jealous of the noonday sun. But the
struggle to share one horizon between both orbs cannot last forever.
raising your head, in a glance, in the motion of your hands, your love
spoke as the sea speaks through its waves. On a sudden my voice would send
your heart quivering through your limbs--have I never witnessed it? I know
you, and therefore you are my captive for ever. The very king of your Gods
shall not sever this bond.
KACHA
Was it for this, Devayani, that I toiled, away from home and kindred, all
these years?
DEVAYANI
Why not? Is only knowledge precious? Is love cheap? Lay hold on this
moment. Have the courage to own that a woman's heart is worth all as much
penance as men undergo for the sake of power, knowledge, or reputation.
KACHA
I gave my solemn promise to the Gods that I would bring them this lore of
deathless life.
DEVAYANI
But is it true you had eyes for nothing save your books? That you never
broke off your studies to pay me homage with flowers, never lay in wait for
a chance, of an evening, to help me water my flower-beds? What made you sit
by me on the grass and sing songs you brought hither from the assembly of
the stars, while darkness stooped over the river bank as love droops over
its own sad silence? Were these parts of a cruel conspiracy plotted in your
Paradise? Was all for the sake of access to my father's heart? --and after
success, were you, departing, to throw some cheap gratitude, like small
coins, to the deluded door-keeper?
KACHA
What profit were there, proud woman, in knowing the truth? If I did wrong
to serve you with a passionate devotion cherished in secret, I have had
ample punishment. This is no time to question whether my love be true or
not; my life's work awaits me. Though my heart must henceforth enclose a
red flame vainly striving to devour emptiness, still I must go back to that
Paradise which will nevermore be Paradise to me. I owe the Gods a new
divinity, hard won by my studies, before I may think of happiness. Forgive
me, Devayani, and know that my suffering is doubled by the pain I
unwillingly inflict on you.
DEVAYANI
Forgiveness! You have angered my heart till it is hard and burning like a
thunderbolt! You can go back to your work and your glory, but what is left
for me? Memory is a bed of thorns, and secret shame will gnaw at the roots
of my life. You came like a wayfarer, sat through the sunny hours in the
shade of my garden, and to while time away you plucked all its flowers and
wove them into a chain. And now, parting, you snap the thread and let the
flowers drop on the dust! Accursed be that great knowledge you have
earned! --a burden that, though others share equally with you, will never be
lightened. For lack of love may it ever remain as foreign to your life as
the cold stars are to the un-espoused darkness of virgin Night!
21
I
"Why these preparations without end? "--I said to Mind--"Is some one to
come? "
Mind replied, "I am enormously busy gathering things and building towers. I
have no time to answer such questions. "
Meekly I went back to my work.
When things were grown to a pile, when seven wings of his palace were
complete, I said to Mind, "Is it not enough? "
Mind began to say, "Not enough to contain--" and then stopped.
"Contain what? " I asked.
Mind affected not to hear.
I suspected that Mind did not know, and with ceaseless work smothered the
question.
His one refrain was, "I must have more. "
"Why must you? "
"Because it is great. "
"What is great? "
Mind remained silent. I pressed for an answer.
In contempt and anger, Mind said, "Why ask about things that are not? Take
notice of those that are hugely before you,--the struggle and the fight,
the army and armaments, the bricks and mortar, and labourers without
number. "
I thought "Possibly Mind is wise. "
II
Days passed. More wings were added to his palace--more lands to his domain.
The season of rains came to an end. The dark clouds became white and thin,
and in the rain-washed sky the sunny hours hovered like butterflies over an
unseen flower. I was bewildered and asked everybody I met, "What is that
music in the breeze? "
A tramp walked the road whose dress was wild as his manner; he said, "Hark
to the music of the Coming! "
I cannot tell why I was convinced, but the words broke from me, "We have
not much longer to wait. "
"It is close at hand," said the mad man.
I went to the office and boldly said to Mind, "Stop all work! "
Mind asked, "Have you any news? "
"Yes," I answered, "News of the Coming. " But I could not explain.
Mind shook his head and said, "There are neither banners nor pageantry! "
III
The night waned, the stars paled in the sky. Suddenly the touchstone of the
morning light tinged everything with gold. A cry spread from mouth to
mouth--
"Here is the herald! "
I bowed my head and asked, "Is he coming? "
The answer seemed to burst from all sides, "Yes. "
Mind grew troubled and said, "The dome of my building is not yet finished,
nothing is in order. "
A voice came from the sky, "Pull down your building! "
"But why? " asked Mind.
"Because to-day is the day of the Coming, and your building is in the way. "
IV
The lofty building lies in the dust and all is scattered and broken.
Mind looked about. But what was there to see?
Only the morning star and the lily washed in dew.
And what else? A child running laughing from its mother's arms into the
open light.
"Was it only for this that they said it was the day of the Coming? "
"Yes, this was why they said there was music in the air and light in the
sky. "
"And did they claim all the earth only for this? "
"Yes," came the answer. "Mind, you build walls to imprison yourself. Your
servants toil to enslave themselves; but the whole earth and infinite space
are for the child, for the New Life. "
"What does that child bring you? "
"Hope for all the world and its joy. "
Mind asked me, "Poet, do you understand? "
"I lay my work aside," I said, "for I must have time to understand. "
22
TRANSLATIONS
VAISHNAVA SONGS
1
Oh Sakhi,[1] my sorrow knows no bounds.
[Footnote 1: The woman friend of a woman. ]
August comes laden with rain clouds and my house is desolate.
The stormy sky growls, the earth is flooded with rain, my love is far away,
and my heart is torn with anguish.
The peacocks dance, for the clouds rumble and frogs croak.
The night brims with darkness flicked with lightning.
Vidyapati[2] asks, "Maiden, how are you to spend your days and nights
without your lord? "
[Footnote 2: The name of the poet. ]
2
Lucky was my awakening this morning, for I saw my beloved.
The sky was one piece of joy, and my life and youth were fulfilled.
To-day my house becomes my house in truth, and my body my body.
Fortune has proved a friend, and my doubts are dispelled.
Birds, sing your best; moon, shed your fairest light!
Let fly your darts, Love-God, in millions!
I wait for the moment when my body will grow golden at his touch.
Vidyapati says, "Immense is your good fortune, and blessed is your love. "
3
I feel my body vanishing into the dust whereon my beloved walks.
I feel one with the water of the lake where he bathes.
Oh Sakhi, my love crosses death's boundary when I meet him.
My heart melts in the light and merges in the mirror whereby he views his
face.
I move with the air to kiss him when he waves his fan, and wherever he
wanders I enclose him like the sky.
Govindadas says, "You are the gold-setting, fair maiden, he is the
emerald. "
4
My love, I will keep you hidden in my eyes; I will thread your image like a
gem on my joy and hang it on my bosom.
You have been in my heart ever since I was a child, throughout my youth,
throughout my life, even through all my dreams.
You dwell in my being when I sleep and when I wake.
Know that I am a woman, and bear with me when you find me wanting.
For I have thought and thought and know for certain that all that is left
for me in this world is your love, and if I lose you for a moment I die.
Chandidas says, "Be tender to her who is yours in life and death. "
5
"Fruit to sell, Fruit to sell," cried the woman at the door.
The Child came out of the house.
"Give me some fruit," said he, putting a handful of rice in her basket.
The fruit-seller gazed at his face and her eyes swam with tears.
"Who is the fortunate mother," she cried, "that has clasped you in her arms
and fed you at her breast, and whom your dear voice called 'Mother'? "
"Offer your fruit to him," says the poet, "and with it your life. "
II
1
Endlessly varied art thou in the exuberant world, Lady of Manifold
Magnificence. Thy path is strewn with lights, thy touch thrills into
flowers; that trailing skirt of thine sweeps the whirl of a dance among the
stars, and thy many-toned music is echoed from innumerable worlds through
signs and colours.
Single and alone in the unfathomed stillness of the soul, art thou, Lady of
Silence and Solitude, a vision thrilled with light, a lonely lotus
blossoming on the stem of love.
2
Behind the rusty iron gratings of the opposite window sits a girl, dark and
plain of face, like a boat stranded on a sand-bank when the river is
shallow in the summer.
I come back to my room after my day's work, and my tired eyes are lured to
her.
She seems to me like a lake with its dark lonely waters edged by moonlight.
She has only her window for freedom: there the morning light meets her
musings, and through it her dark eyes like lost stars travel back to their
sky.
3
I remember the day.
The heavy shower of rain is slackening into fitful pauses, renewed gusts of
wind startle it from a first lull.
I take up my instrument. Idly I touch the strings, till, without my
knowing, the music borrows the mad cadence of that storm.
I see her figure as she steals from her work, stops at my door, and
retreats with hesitating steps. She comes again, stands outside leaning
against the wall, then slowly enters the room and sits down. With head
bent, she plies her needle in silence; but soon stops her work, and looks
out of the window through the rain at the blurred line of trees.
Only this--one hour of a rainy noon filled with shadows and song and
silence.
4
While stepping into the carriage she turned her head and threw me a swift
glance of farewell.
This was her last gift to me. But where can I keep it safe from the
trampling hours?
Must evening sweep this gleam of anguish away, as it will the last flicker
of fire from the sunset?
Ought it to be washed off by the rain, as treasured pollens are from
heart-broken flowers?
Leave kingly glory and the wealth of the rich to death. But may not tears
keep ever fresh the memory of a glance flung through a passionate moment?
"Give it to me to keep," said my song; "I never touch kings' glory or the
wealth of the rich, but these small things are mine for ever. "
5
You give yourself to me, like a flower that blossoms at night, whose
presence is known by the dew that drips from it, by the odour shed through
the darkness, as the first steps of Spring are by the buds that thicken the
twigs.
You break upon my thought like waves at the high tide, and my heart is
drowned under surging songs.
My heart knew of your coming, as the night feels the approach of dawn. The
clouds are aflame and my sky fills with a great revealing flood.
6
I was to go away; still she did not speak. But I felt, from a slight
quiver, her yearning arms would say: "Ah no, not yet. "
I have often heard her pleading hands vocal in a touch, though they knew
not what they said.
I have known those arms to stammer when, had they not, they would have
become youth's garland round my neck.
Their little gestures return to remembrance in the covert of still hours,
like truants they playfully reveal things she had kept secret from me.
7
My songs are like bees; they follow through the air some fragrant
trace--some memory--of you, to hum around your shyness, eager for its
hidden store.
When the freshness of dawn droops in the sun, when in the noon the air
hangs low with heaviness and the forest is silent, my songs return home,
their languid wings dusted with gold.
8
I believe you had visited me in a vision before we ever met, like some
foretaste of April before the spring broke into flower.
That vision must have come when all was bathed in the odour of _sal_
blossom; when the twilight twinkle of the river fringed its yellow sands,
and the vague sounds of a summer afternoon were blended; yes, and had it
not laughed and evaded me in many a nameless gleam at other moments?
9
I think I shall stop startled if ever we meet after our next birth, walking
in the light of a far-away world.
I shall know those dark eyes then as morning stars, and yet feel that they
have belonged to some unremembered evening sky of a former life.
I shall know that the magic of your face is not all its own, but has stolen
the passionate light that was in my eyes at some immemorial meeting, and
then gathered from my love a mystery that has now forgotten its origin.
10
Lay down your lute, my love, leave your arms free to embrace me.
Let your touch bring my overflowing heart to my body's utmost brink.
Do not bend your neck and turn away your face, but offer up a kiss to me,
which has been like some perfume long closed in a bud.
Do not smother this moment under vain words, but let our hearts quake in a
rush of silence sweeping all thoughts to the shoreless delight.
11
You have made me great with your love, though I am but one among the many,
drifting in the common tide, rocking in the fluctuant favour of the world.
You have given me a seat where poets of all time bring their tribute, and
lovers with deathless names greet one another across the ages.
Men hastily pass me in the market,--never noting how my body has grown
precious with your caress, how I carry your kiss within, as the sun carries
in its orb the fire of the divine touch and shines for ever.
12
Like a child that frets and pushes away its toys, my heart to-day shakes
its head at every phrase I suggest, and says, "No, not this. "
Yet words, in the agony of their vagueness, haunt my mind, like vagrant
clouds hovering over hills, waiting for some chance wind to relieve them of
their rain.
But leave these vain efforts, my soul, for the stillness will ripen its own
music in the dark.
My life to-day is like a cloister during some penance, where the spring is
afraid to stir or to whisper.
This is not the time, my love, for you to pass the gate; at the mere
thought of your anklet bells tinkling down the path, the garden echoes are
ashamed.
Know that to-morrow's songs are in bud to-day, and should they see you walk
by they would strain to breaking their immature hearts.
13
Whence do you bring this disquiet, my love?
Let my heart touch yours and kiss the pain out of your silence.
The night has thrown up from its depth this little hour, that love may
build a new world within these shut doors, to be lighted by this solitary
lamp.
We have for music but a single reed which our two pairs of lips must play
on by turns--for crown, only one garland to bind my hair after I have put
it on your forehead.
Tearing the veil from my breast I shall make our bed on the floor; and one
kiss and one sleep of delight shall fill our small boundless world.
14
All that I had I gave to you, keeping but the barest veil of reserve.
It is so thin that you secretly smile at it and I feel ashamed.
The gust of the spring breeze sweeps it away unawares, and the flutter of
my own heart moves it as the waves move their foam.
My love, do not grieve if I keep this flimsy mist of distance round me.
This frail reserve of mine is no mere woman's coyness, but a slender stem
on which the flower of my self-surrender bends towards you with reticent
grace.
15
I have donned this new robe to-day because my body feels like singing.
It is not enough that I am given to my love once and for ever, but out of
that I must fashion new gifts every day; and shall I not seem a fresh
offering, dressed in a new robe?
My heart, like the evening sky, has its endless passion for colour, and
therefore I change my veils, which have now the green of the cool young
grass and now that of the winter rice.
To-day my robe is tinted with the rain-rimmed blue of the sky. It brings to
my limbs the colour of the boundless, the colour of the oversea hills; and
it carries in its folds the delight of summer clouds flying in the wind.
16
I thought I would write love's words in their own colour; but that lies
deep in the heart, and tears are pale.
Would you know them, friend, if the words were colourless?
I thought I would sing love's words to their own tune, but that sounds only
in my heart, and my eyes are silent.
Would you know them, friend, if there were no tune?
17
In the night the song came to me; but you were not there.
It found the words for which I had been seeking all day. Yes, in the
stillness a moment after dark they throbbed into music, even as the stars
then began to pulse with light; but you were not there. My hope was to sing
it to you in the morning; but, try as I might, though the music came, the
words hung back, when you were beside me.
18
The night deepens and the dying flame flickers in the lamp.
I forgot to notice when the evening--like a village girl who has filled her
pitcher at the river a last time for that day--closed the door on her
cabin.
I was speaking to you, my love, with mind barely conscious of my
voice--tell me, had it any meaning? Did it bring you any message from
beyond life's borders?
For now, since my voice has ceased, I feel the night throbbing with
thoughts that gaze in awe at the abyss of their dumbness.
19
When we two first met my heart rang out in music, "She who is eternally
afar is beside you for ever. "
That music is silent, because I have grown to believe that my love is only
near, and have forgotten that she is also far, far away.
Music fills the infinite between two souls. This has been muffled by the
mist of our daily habits.
On shy summer nights, when the breeze brings a vast murmur out of the
silence, I sit up in my bed and mourn the great loss of her who is beside
me. I ask myself, "When shall I have another chance to whisper to her words
with the rhythm of eternity in them? "
Wake up, my song, from thy languor, rend this screen of the familiar, and
fly to my beloved there, in the endless surprise of our first meeting!
20
Lovers come to you, my Queen, and proudly lay their riches at your feet:
but my tribute is made up of unfulfilled hopes.
Shadows have stolen across the heart of my world and the best in me has
lost light.
While the fortunate laugh at my penury, I ask you to lend my failings your
tears, and so make them precious.
I bring you a voiceless instrument.
I strained to reach a note which was too high in my heart, and the string
broke.
While masters laugh at the snapped cord, I ask you to take my lute in your
hands and fill its hollowness with your songs.
21
The father came back from the funeral rites.
His boy of seven stood at the window, with eyes wide open and a golden
amulet hanging from his neck, full of thoughts too difficult for his age.
His father took him in his arms and the boy asked him, "Where is mother? "
"In heaven," answered his father, pointing to the sky.
At night the father groaned in slumber, weary with grief.
A lamp dimly burned near the bedroom door, and a lizard chased moths on the
wall.
The boy woke up from sleep, felt with his hands the emptiness in the bed,
and stole out to the open terrace.
The boy raised his eyes to the sky and long gazed in silence. His
bewildered mind sent abroad into the night the question, "Where is heaven? "
No answer came: and the stars seemed like the burning tears of that
ignorant darkness.
22
She went away when the night was about to wane.
My mind tried to console me by saying, "All is vanity. "
I felt angry and said, "That unopened letter with her name on it, and this
palm-leaf fan bordered with red silk by her own hands, are they not real? "
The day passed, and my friend came and said to me, "Whatever is good is
true, and can never perish. "
"How do you know? " I asked impatiently; "was not this body good which is
now lost to the world? "
As a fretful child hurting its own mother, I tried to wreck all the
shelters that ever I had, in and about me, and cried, "This world is
treacherous. "
Suddenly I felt a voice saying--"Ungrateful! "
I looked out of the window, and a reproach seemed to come from the
star-sprinkled night,--"You pour out into the void of my absence your faith
in the truth that I came! "
23
The river is grey and the air dazed with blown sand.
On a morning of dark disquiet, when the birds are mute and their nests
shake in the gust, I sit alone and ask myself, "Where is she? "
The days have flown wherein we sat too near each other; we laughed and
jested, and the awe of love's majesty found no words at our meetings.
I made myself small, and she trifled away every moment with pelting talk.
To-day I wish in vain that she were by me, in the gloom of the coming
storm, to sit in the soul's solitude.
24
The name she called me by, like a flourishing jasmine, covered the whole
seventeen years of our love. With its sound mingled the quiver of the light
through the leaves, the scent of the grass in the rainy night, and the sad
silence of the last hour of many an idle day.
Not the work of God alone was he who answered to that name; she created him
again for herself during those seventeen swift years.
Other years were to follow, but their vagrant days, no longer gathered
within the fold of that name uttered in her voice, stray and are scattered.
They ask me, "Who should fold us? "
I find no answer and sit silent, and they cry to me while dispersing, "We
seek a shepherdess! "
Whom should they seek?
That they do not know. And like derelict evening clouds they drift in the
trackless dark, and are lost and forgotten.
25
I feel that your brief days of love have not been left behind in those
scanty years of your life.
I seek to know in what place, away from the slow-thieving dust, you keep
them now. I find in my solitude some song of your evening that died, yet
left a deathless echo; and the sighs of your unsatisfied hours I find
nestled in the warm quiet of the autumn noon.
Your desires come from the hive of the past to haunt my heart, and I sit
still to listen to their wings.
26
You have taken a bath in the dark sea. You are once again veiled in a
bride's robe, and through death's arch you come back to repeat our wedding
in the soul.
Neither lute nor drum is struck, no crowd has gathered, not a wreath is
hung on the gate.
Your unuttered words meet mine in a ritual unillumined by lamps.
27
I was walking along a path overgrown with grass, when suddenly I heard from
some one behind, "See if you know me? "
I turned round and looked at her and said, "I cannot remember your name. "
She said, "I am that first great Sorrow whom you met when you were young. "
Her eyes looked like a morning whose dew is still in the air.
I stood silent for some time till I said, "Have you lost all the great
burden of your tears? "
She smiled and said nothing. I felt that her tears had had time to learn
the language of smiles.
"Once you said," she whispered, "that you would cherish your grief for
ever. "
I blushed and said, "Yes, but years have passed and I forget. "
Then I took her hand in mine and said, "But you have changed. "
"What was sorrow once has now become peace," she said.
28
Our life sails on the uncrossed sea whose waves chase each other in an
eternal hide-and-seek.
It is the restless sea of change, feeding its foaming flocks to lose them
over and over again, beating its hands against the calm of the sky.
Love, in the centre of this circling war-dance of light and dark, yours is
that green island, where the sun kisses the shy forest shade and silence is
wooed by birds' singing.
29
AMA AND VINAYAKA
AMA AND VINAYAKA
_Night on the battlefield:_ AMA _meets her father_ VINAYAKA.
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Shameless wanton, you call me "Father"! you who did not shrink from a
Mussulman husband!
AMA
Though you have treacherously killed my husband, yet you are my father; and
I hold back a widow's tears, lest they bring God's curse on you. Since we
have met on this battlefield after years of separation, let me bow to your
feet and take my last leave!
VINAYAKA
Where will you go, Ama? The tree on which you built your impious nest is
hewn down. Where will _you_ take shelter?
AMA
I have my son.
VINAYAKA
Leave him! Cast never a fond look back on the result of a sin expiated with
blood! Think where to go.
AMA
Death's open gates are wider than a father's love!
VINAYAKA
Death indeed swallows sins as the sea swallows the mud of rivers. But you
are to die neither to-night nor here. Seek some solitary shrine of holy
Shiva far from shamed kindred and all neighbours; bathe three times a day
in sacred Ganges, and, while reciting God's name, listen to the last bell
of evening worship, that Death may look tenderly upon you, as a father on
his sleeping child whose eyes are still wet with tears. Let him gently
carry you into his own great silence, as the Ganges carries a fallen flower
on its stream, washing every stain away to render it, a fit offering, to
the sea.
AMA
But my son----
VINAYAKA
Again I bid you not to speak of him. Lay yourself once more in a father's
arms, my child, like a babe fresh from the womb of Oblivion, your second
mother.
AMA
To me the world has become a shadow. Your words I hear, but cannot take to
heart. Leave me, father, leave me alone! Do not try to bind me with your
love, for its bands are red with my husband's blood.
VINAYAKA
Alas! no flower ever returns to the parent branch it dropped from. How can
you call him _husband_ who forcibly snatched you from Jivaji to whom you
had been sacredly affianced? I shall never forget that night! In the
wedding hall we sat anxiously expecting the bridegroom, for the auspicious
hour was dwindling away. Then in the distance appeared the glare of
torches, and bridal strains came floating up the air. We shouted for joy:
women blew their conch-shells. A procession of palanquins entered the
courtyard: but while we were asking, "Where is Jivaji? " armed men burst out
of the litters like a storm, and bore you off before we knew what had
happened. Shortly after, Jivaji came to tell us he had been waylaid and
captured by a Mussulman noble of the Vijapur court. That night Jivaji and I
touched the nuptial fire and swore bloody death to this villain. After
waiting long, we have been freed from our solemn pledge to-night; and the
spirit of Jivaji, who lost his life in this battle, lawfully claims you for
wife.
AMA
Father, it may be that I have disgraced the rites of your house, but my
honour is unsullied; I loved him to whom I bore a son. I remember the night
when I received two secret messages, one from you, one from my mother;
yours said: "I send you the knife; kill him! " My mother's: "I send you the
poison; end your life! " Had unholy force dishonoured me, your double
bidding had been obeyed. But my body was yielded only after love had given
_me_--love all the greater, all the purer, in that it overcame the
hereditary recoil of our blood from the Mussulman.
_Enter_ RAMA, AMA'S _mother_
AMA
Mother mine, I had not hoped to see you again. Let me take dust from your
feet.
RAMA
Touch me not with impure hands!
AMA
I am as pure as yourself.
RAMA
To whom have you surrendered your honour?
AMA
To my husband.
RAMA
Husband? A Mussulman the husband of a Brahmin woman?
AMA
I do not merit contempt: I am proud to say I never despised my husband
though a Mussulman. If Paradise will reward your devotion to your husband,
then the same Paradise waits for your daughter, who has been as true a
wife.
RAMA
Are you indeed a true wife?
AMA
Yes.
RAMA
Do you know how to die without flinching?
AMA
I do.
RAMA
Then let the funeral fire be lighted for you! See, there lies the body of
your husband.
AMA
Jivaji?
RAMA
Yes, Jivaji. He was your husband by plighted troth. The baffled fire of the
nuptial God has raged into the hungry fire of death, and the interrupted
wedding shall be completed now.
VINAYAKA
Do not listen, my child. Go back to your son, to your own nest darkened
with sorrow. My duty has been performed to its extreme cruel end, and
nothing now remains for you to do. --Wife, your grief is fruitless. Were the
branch dead which was violently snapped from our tree, I should give it to
the fire. But it has sent living roots into a new soil and is bearing
flowers and fruits. Allow her, without regret, to obey the laws of those
among whom she has loved. Come, wife, it is time we cut all worldly ties
and spent our remainder lives in the seclusion of some peaceful pilgrim
shrine.
RAMA
I am ready: but first must tread into dust every sprout of sin and shame
that has sprung from the soil of our life. A daughter's infamy stains her
mother's honour. That black shame shall feed glowing fire to-night, and
raise a true wife's memorial over the ashes of my daughter.
AMA
Mother, if by force you unite me in death with one who was not my husband,
then will you bring a curse upon yourself for desecrating the shrine of the
Eternal Lord of Death.
RAMA
Soldiers, light the fire; surround the woman!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Do not fear. Alas, my child, that you should ever have to call your father
to save you from your mother's hands!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Come to me, my darling child! Mere vanity are these man-made laws,
splashing like spray against the rock of heaven's ordinance. Bring your son
to me, and we will live together, my daughter. A father's love, like God's
rain, does not judge but is poured forth from an abounding source.
RAMA
Where would you go? Turn back! --Soldiers, stand firm in your loyalty to
your master Jivaji! do your last sacred duty by him!
AMA
Father!
VINAYAKA
Free her, soldiers! She is my daughter.
SOLDIERS
She is the widow of our master.
VINAYAKA
Her husband, though a Mussulman, was staunch in his own faith.
RAMA
Soldiers, keep this old man under control!
AMA
I defy you, mother! --You, soldiers, I defy! --for through death and love I
win to freedom.
30
A painter was selling pictures at the fair; followed by servants, there
passed the son of a minister who in youth had cheated this painter's father
so that he had died of a broken heart.
The boy lingered before the pictures and chose one for himself. The painter
flung a cloth over it and said he would not sell it.
After this the boy pined heart-sick till his father came and offered a
large price. But the painter kept the picture unsold on his shop-wall and
grimly sat before it, saying to himself, "This is my revenge. "
The sole form this painter's worship took was to trace an image of his god
every morning.
And now he felt these pictures grow daily more different from those he used
to paint.
This troubled him, and he sought in vain for an explanation till one day he
started up from work in horror, the eyes of the god he had just drawn were
those of the minister, and so were the lips.
He tore up the picture, crying, "My revenge has returned on my head! "
31
The General came before the silent and angry King and saluting him said:
"The village is punished, the men are stricken to dust, and the women cower
in their unlit homes afraid to weep aloud. "
The High Priest stood up and blessed the King and cried: "God's mercy is
ever upon you. "
The Clown, when he heard this, burst out laughing and startled the court.
The King's frown darkened.
"The honour of the throne," said the minister, "is upheld by the King's
prowess and the blessing of Almighty God. "
Louder laughed the Clown, and the King growled,--"Unseemly mirth! "
"God has showered many blessings upon your head," said the Clown; "the one
he bestowed on me was the gift of laughter. "
"This gift will cost you your life," said the King, gripping his sword with
his right hand.
Yet the Clown stood up and laughed till he laughed no more.
A shadow of dread fell upon the Court, for they heard that laughter echoing
in the depth of God's silence.
32
THE MOTHER'S PRAYER
THE MOTHER'S PRAYER
_Prince Duryodhana, the son of the blind Kaurava King Dhritarashtra, and of
Queen Gandhari, has played with his cousins the Pandava Kings for their
kingdom, and won it by fraud. _
DHRITARASHTRA
You have compassed your end.
DURYODHANA
Success is mine!
DHRITARASHTRA
Are you happy?
DURYODHANA
I am victorious.
DHRITARASHTRA
I ask you again, what happiness have you in winning the undivided kingdom?
DURYODHANA
Sire, a Kshatriya thirsts not after happiness but victory, that fiery wine
pressed from seething jealousy. Wretchedly happy we were, like those
inglorious stains that lie idly on the breast of the moon, when we lived in
peace under the friendly dominance of our cousins. Then these Pandavas
milked the world of its wealth, and allowed us a share, in brotherly
tolerance. Now that they own defeat and expect banishment, I am no longer
happy but exultant.
DHRITARASHTRA
Wretch, you forget that both Pandavas and Kauravas have the same
forefathers.
DURYODHANA
It was difficult to forget that, and therefore our inequalities rankled in
my heart. At midnight the moon is never jealous of the noonday sun. But the
struggle to share one horizon between both orbs cannot last forever.
