RABINDRANATH TAGORE
SELECTED POEMS III
TRANSLATED & PRESENTED BY
PRITHWINDRA MUKHERJEE
51. SURRENDER
O bend my head up to the dust of Your feet,
Wash out all my vanity with mine own tears.
Seeking ever to glorify my self
I keep on merely humiliating myself,
Ceaselessly winding around myself
I roam about from moment to moment
Wash out all my vanity with mine own tears.
Let me no more vaunt myself in mine occupation,
Accomplish Your own will throughout my life.
I long for the absolute peace from You,
Inside my being Your effulgence,
Protect me by standing on the lotus of my heart,
Wash out all my vanity with mine own tears.
[ Gitanjali, "Song Offering" No.1, 1906]1
52. KNOWING YOU
Countless are the persons You made me know,
Sheltered me in countless homes,
You turned the distant into an intimate, O Friend,
And the foreigner into a brother.
Each time I have to leave an old dwelling
My mind gets worried not to know what is up
Forgetting that You remain the familiar
1 The serial numbers in the Bengali collection Gitanjali are distinct from those utilised by Tagore in the homonymous anthology of his poems in English
In the midst of the new,
You turned the distant into an intimate, O Friend,
And the foreigner into a brother.
In life or in death, in the totality of this globe,
Wherever you choose to carry me,
O my life-long acquaintance,
Whatever You will reveal to me.
Others cease to be strangers once You are known,
Taboos vanish and vanishes all fear;
You remain wakeful by uniting everybody
May I always realise it,
You turned the distant into an intimate, O Friend,
And the foreigner into a brother.
[ Gitanjali, "Song Offering" No.3, 1906]
53. REFT FROM LOVE
If You cared not to fill the heart with love
Why did You permeate the morning sky
With abundant songs ?
Why weave wreaths with the stars ?
Why the flowery beds ?
Why does the west-wind murmur
A secret message in our ears ?
If You cared not to fill the heart with love,
Why keeps the sky staring at us
Intently ?
Why does my heart frequently
Become enraged
Embarking the raft on an ocean
Where the shore remains unknown ?
[ Gitimalya, "Garland of Songs" No.42, 1913]