Rabindranath Tagore

“ When you dance before the gods, flinging orbits of novel rhythm into space, Urvashi, the earth shivers, leaf and grass, and autumn fields heave and sway; the sea surges into a frenzy of rhyming waves; the stars drop into the sky—beads from the chain that leaps till it breaks on your breast; and the blood dances in men's hearts with sudden turmoil.
You are the first break on the crest of heaven's slumber, Urvashi, you thrill the air with unrest. The world bathes your limbs in her tears; with colour of her heart's blood are your feet red ”

“ I am poured forth in living notes of joy and sorrow by your breath.
Mornings and evenings in summer and in rains, I am fashioned to music.
Should I be wholly spent in some flight of song, I shall not grieve, the tune is so dear to me.
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My heart is a flute he has played on. If ever it fall into other hands let him fling it away.
My lover's flute is dear to him, therefore if to-day alien breath have entered it and sounded strange notes, let him break it to pieces and strew the dust with them.
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In love the aim is neither pain nor pleasure but love only. ”

“ 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. ”

“ SHADES Stop a few moments among us. The earth's tears still cling about you, like dew on freshly culled flowers. You have brought with you the mingled odours of meadow and forest; reminiscence of children, women, and comrades; something too of the ineffable music of the seasons.
SOMAKA Master, why are you doomed to live in this muffled stagnant world?
RITVIK I offered up your son in the sacrificial fire: that sin has lodged my soul in this obscurity.
SHADES King, tell us the story, we implore you; the recital of crime can still bring life's fire into our torpor. ”

“ Love is lit from love as fire from fire, but whence came the first flame?
In your being it leaps under the rod of pain.
Then, when the hidden fire flames forth, the in and the out are one and all barriers fall in ashes.
Let the pain glow fiercely, burst from the heart and beat back darkness, need you be afraid?
The poet says, "Who can buy love without paying its price? When you fail to give yourself you make the whole world miserly."
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Eyes see only dust and earth, but feel with the heart, and know pure joy. ”

“ Ah! who was that unhappy woman whose eyes kissed your bare, slim body through tears that blessed you, where she sat among the women of the royal household behind the arras? Why, the mother of Arjuna! Then the Brahmin, master of arms, stepped forth and said, "No youth of mean birth may challenge Arjuna to a trial of strength." You stood speechless, like a thunder-cloud at sunset flashing with an agony of suppressed light. But who was the woman whose heart caught fire from your shame and anger, and flared up in silence? The mother of Arjuna! ”

“ 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. ”

“ I forget if you ever shamed me by looking away when I bared my heart.
I only remember the words that stranded on the tremor of your lips; I remember in your dark eyes sweeping shadows of passion, like the wings of a home-seeking bird in the dusk.
I forget that you do not remember, and I come.
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The rain fell fast. The river rushed and hissed. It licked up and swallowed the island, while I waited alone on the lessening bank with my sheaves of corn in a heap.
From the shadows of the opposite shore the boat crosses with a woman at the helm. ”

“ Be not concerned about her heart, my heart: leave it in the dark.
What if her beauty be of the figure and her smile merely of the face? Let me take without question the simple meaning of her glances and be happy.
I care not if it be a web of delusion that her arms wind about me, for the web itself is rich and rare, and the deceit can be smiled at and forgotten.
Be not concerned about her heart, my heart: be content if the music is true, though the words are not to be believed; enjoy the grace that dances like a lily on the rippling, deceiving surface, whatever may lie beneath. ”

“ Come, Spring, reckless lover of the earth, make the forest's heart pant for utterance!
Come in gusts of disquiet where flowers break open and jostle the new leaves!
Burst, like a rebellion of light, through the night's vigil, through the lake's dark dumbness, through the dungeon under the dust, proclaiming freedom to the shackled seeds!
Like the laughter of lightning, like the shout of a storm, break into the midst of the noisy town; free stifled word and unconscious effort, reinforce our flagging fight, and conquer death! ”

“ Oblivious night wears on, the morning of reckoning nears, I hear the thundering roar of its chariot. Woman, bow your head down to the dust! and as a sacrifice fling your heart under those wheels! Darkness will shroud the sky, earth will tremble, wailing will rend the air and then comes the silent and cruel end,—that terrible peace, that great forgetting, and awful extinction of hatred—the supreme deliverance rising from the fire of death. ”

“ 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. ”

“ And it amused me to tears to think how this little child dared to fight the giant world of necessity with no other resource than those few words, "Father, you must not go!"
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Take your holiday, my boy; there are the blue sky and the bare field, the barn and the ruined temple under the ancient tamarind.
My holiday must be taken through yours, finding light in the dance of your eyes, music in your noisy shouts.
To you autumn brings the true holiday freedom: to me it brings the impossibility of work; for lo! you burst into my room.
Yes, my holiday is an endless freedom for love to disturb me. ”

“ 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. Thank heaven, that struggle is over, and we have at last won solitude in glory. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Neither mother nor daughter are you, nor bride, Urvashi. [1] Woman you are, to ravish the soul of Paradise.
[Footnote 1: The dancing girl of Paradise who rose from the sea.]
When weary-footed evening comes down to the folds whither the cattle have returned, you never trim the house lamps nor walk to the bridal bed with a tremulous heart and a wavering smile on your lips, glad that the dark hours are so secret.
Like the dawn you are without veil, Urvashi, and without shame. ”

“ It is only the spell of the night and my farewell words, startled at their own tune of despair, which bring these tears to my eyes. But day will dawn, my eyes will dry and my heart; and there will be no time for weeping.
Who says it is hard to forget?
The mercy of death works at life's core, bringing it respite from its own foolish persistence.
The stormy sea is lulled at last in its rocking cradle; the forest fire falls to sleep on its bed of ashes. ”

“ Adored are you of all men in all ages, Urvashi, O endless wonder!
The world throbs with youthful pain at the glance of your eyes, the ascetic lays the fruit of his austerities at your feet, the songs of poets hum and swarm round the perfume of your presence. Your feet, as in careless joy they flit on, wound even the heart of the hollow wind with the tinkle of golden bells. ”

“ 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.
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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. ”

“ If after the day's lessons, in the evening solitude, some strange tremor of joy shook your heart, remember that—but not gratitude. If, as some one passed, a snatch of song got tangled among your texts or the swing of a robe fluttered your studies with delight, remember that when at leisure in your Paradise. What, benefits only!—and neither beauty nor love nor...?
KACHA Some things are beyond the power of words.
DEVAYANI Yes, yes, I know. My love has sounded your heart's deepest, and makes me bold to speak in defiance of your reserve. Never leave me! remain here! fame gives no happiness. ”

“ For now, since my voice has ceased, I feel the night throbbing with thoughts that gaze in awe at the abyss of their dumbness.
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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. ”

“ Why is such splendour about you to lure the heart of one who is nothing?
Answer
Great is the festival hall where you are to be the only guest.
Therefore the letter to you is written from sky to sky, and I, the proud servant, bring the invitation with all ceremony.
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I had travelled all day and was tired, then I bowed my head towards thy kingly court still far away.
The night deepened, a longing burned in my heart; whatever the words I sang, pain cried through them, for even my songs thirsted. O my Lover, my Beloved, my best in all the world! ”

“ The water is neither wide nor deep—a mere break in the path that enhances the small adventures of daily life, like a break in the words of a song across which the tune gleefully streams.
While the towers of wealth rise high and crash to ruin, these villages talk to each other across the garrulous stream, and the ferry-boat plies between them, age after age, from seed-time to harvest.
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In the evening after they have brought their cattle home, they sit on the grass before their huts to know that you are among them unseen, to repeat in their songs the name which they have fondly given you. ”