Rabindaranath Tagores Poems III by Viswadeep Das - HTML preview

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7

The pilgrims' hearts were benumbed by worry.

The women were weeping; irritated men

enjoined them to keep quiet.

Barking, the dogs moaned, whipped to remain silent.

The night seemed unending.

Shrill in a crescendo, women and men accused each other of crimes.

All shouted and roared

Till when they were unsheathing their daggers and darkness wilted :

Pervading the summits the morning light filled the sky.

Suddenly a calm reigned.

One ray of the sun like an index touched

The peaceful forehead of the blood-smeared corpse.

It drove women lamenting and men hid their faces in their hands.

Some wanting discreetly to flee, could not :

They were tied to their victim with the chain of their crime.

They ask each other : "Who is going to show us the path ?"

The old man from the East replied :

"He whom we have killed will do it."

All were dumbfounded, crestfallen.

The old man continued : "We have denied him out of mistrust,

We have killed him out of anger,

We shall now accept him out of love

Since through death he has been resuscitated to our lives,

That great conqueror of death."

Standing up, all set out to sing in unison :

"Victory, O victory to the conqueror of death."