Erotic Poems from the Sanskrit
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1: “Bonfire” is the translation of puņyāgni. A large fire was usually built in the open air in a village for the benefit of travelers. The fire’s sponsor would acquire merit for his good works.
WISE MEN
Nothing is known of Bhartṛhari (ca. 400). For a reading of the poem, see the introduction, xxxvi–xxxvii.
POETS’ EXCESSES
5–6: Philosophical poet that he was, Bhartṛhari was both fascinated by woman’s body and repelled by it. This is a recurring theme in his poetry. Compare with “Adoration of Woman” (p. 49).
THE LOVE GAME
3–4: The Kāmasūtra (2.2.1–31) notes that a woman’s desire is aroused when a man pets and fondles her. The god of love Kāma’s five arrows target five parts of a woman’s body: heart, breasts, eyes, forehead, and vulva. The arrows are tipped with the red lotus, asoka, mango, jasmine, and blue lotus flowers.
HIPS
Compare with these lines from Lucille Clifton’s (1936–2010) poem “homage to my hips” (1980):
i have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top!
(Lucille Clifton, The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton, 1965–2010, ed. Kevin Young and Michael S. Glaser [Rochester, N.Y.: BOA Editions, 2012], 198).
ADORATION OF WOMAN
Bhartṛhari calls into question, as Shakespeare does in Sonnet 130, the conventional representations of the beloved. The hyperboles in both poems are of course ironic.
My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
…
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
(Katherine Duncan-Jones, ed., Shakespeare’s Sonnets, The Arden Shakespeare [London: Nelson, 1997], 375).
THE POET SPEAKS TO THE KING
For a reading of the poem, see the introduction, pp. xliii–xliv. Other poets, such as Horace (65–8 B.C.E.) and Ovid (43 B.C.E.–?17 C.E.), have made similar claims for their “pow’rful rhyme.” Here are the closing lines of the latter’s Metamorphoses, Book 15:
As long as Rome is the Eternal City
These lines shall echo from the lips of men,
As long as poetry speaks truth on earth,
That immortality is mine to wear.
(Ovid, The Metamorphoses, trans. Horace Gregory [New York: Viking, 1958], 441).
WHITE FLAG
Nowhere is Bhartṛhari more cynical than in this poem, which is awash with taedium vitae.
5–6: A cluster of bones is hung on top of a well to warn everyone that the well is only for the use of outcastes.
ELEMENTARY ARITHMETIC
Bhāskara II (1114–1185), along with Āryabhaṭa (476–550) and Brahmagupta (598–668), laid the foundations of Indian mathematics. He was the head of an astronomical observatory in Ujjayinī (present-day Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh). The poem appears in Ramakrishna Deva’s Manorañjana (Entertainment), a commentary on Bhāskara II’s treatise on arithmetic, Līlāvatī (The beautiful). It is quoted in Henry Thomas Colebrooke’s (1765–1837) translation of the Līlāvatī (1817) in a footnote to verse 54. There were in all thirty pearls in the necklace.
THE CRITIC SCORNED
Bhavabhūti (8th cent.) was a poet at the court of King Yaśovarman of Kānyakubja. Of the three surviving plays by him, The Later Story of Rama (Uttararāmacarita) is one of the finest achievements of Sanskrit drama. This well-known verse appears in the play Mālatī and Mādhava (Mālatīmādhava, 1.6).
3–5: The Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib (1797–1869) famously expressed a similar hope in Persian:
Today none buys my verse’s wine, that it may grow in age
To make the senses reel in many a drinker yet to come.
My star rose highest in the firmament before my birth;
My poetry will win the world’s acclaim when I am gone.
(Ralph Russell, ed., The Oxford India Ghalib: Life, Letters and Ghazals [New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003], 518).
BITTER HARVEST
Bhāvakadevī was a woman poet.
5–6: Compared with the time when they were lovers, marriage seems to have taken the romance out of their lives. It is this unhappy realization that she finds hard to accept. Compare with Śīlābhaṭṭārikā’s poem “Then and Now” (p. 86) on the same theme.
SCRAMBLING OUT OF THE WATER
Bhoja (11th cent.) was the king of Dhārā in present-day Madhya Pradesh. He is best known for a work on poetics, Light on Love (Śṛṅgāraprakāśa).
BITE MARKS
Bilhaṇa (11th cent.) is the author of a poetic sequence titled Fifty Poems of a Thief of Love (Caurapañcāśikā). See p. xviii on Bilhaṇa’s travails in finding a patron.
5: For “marks of my teeth,” see note (p. 102) on “A Taste of Ambrosia.”
DRUMBEATS
A Telugu poem, “Tryst” (Abhisārika), by Duvvuri Ramireddy (1895–1947), echoes Devagupta’s poem.
In the middle of the night
you go to meet your lover,
softly,
as if walking on air.
You hold your anklets in your hand
so they don’t make a sound.
When the owl hoots from his midnight nest,
you look over your shoulder, scared.
You are startled at your own footsteps,
and cry, “Who’s that?”
In your white dress
and your light skin,
no one can see you
in the flood of moonlight.
But the fragrance of your body—
it spreads where you walk.
Girl,
how do you disguise that?
(Velcheru Narayana Rao, ed. and trans., Hibiscus on the Lake: Twentieth-Century Telugu Poetry from India [Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003], 46).
THE WAY
Dharmakīrti (7th cent.), a Brahman from present-day Tamil Nadu, was a Buddhist philosopher who wrote a number of influential works on logic. The poem describes well the poet’s discovery of new thresholds away from the beaten path.
INDRA’S HEAVEN
Jagannātha Paṇḍitarāja (17th cent.), a Telugu Brahman from present-day Andhra Pradesh, wrote the last great work on Sanskrit poetics, the Rasagaṅgādhara (The Ganges bearer [Śiva] of mood). At the Mughal court of Shāh Jahān (r. 1628–1658), Jagannātha is said to have fallen in love with a Muslim girl whom he later married. We know her only as Lavaṅgī, and seven verses in praise of her beauty are attributed to the poet. The story is retold in a Tamil movie, Lavaṅkī (1946), directed by Y. V. Rao, and in a Marathi play, Paṇḍitrāj Jagannāth (1960), written by Vidyadhar Gokhale and produced by Bhalchandra Pendharkar.
I have translated navanītakomalāṅgī (literally, “girl with a body soft as butter”) as “girl with an ever-so-soft body.” The comparison of a girl’s body to freshly churned butter does not sit well in English. It has been suggested by Aryendra Sharma that the phrase navanītakomalāṅgī may well be a translation of the Hindi phrase makkhan ki putlī (a lovely woman [soft as] butter). Jagannātha was, no doubt, familiar with the conventions of Hindi and Urdu poetry of his time. He attempted to breathe life into Sanskrit poetry by introducing new images.
FLIGHT OF THE DEER
Kālidāsa (4th–5th cent.), the preeminent poet in Sanskrit, was the author of three long poems, The Cloud Messenger (Meghadūta), The Origin of the Young God (Kumārasaṃbhava), and The Dynasty of Raghu (Raghuvaṃśa), and of three plays, including his masterpiece, Śakuntalā and the Ring of Recollection (Abhijñānaśākuntala), where this well-known verse appears (1.7).
SUCH INNOCENT MOVES
This verse appears in Kalidasa’s play Mālavikā and Agnimitra (Mālavikāgnimitra, 4.15).
THE LAMP
6: “Secret places” is the translation of nābhimūla (the part of the body below the navel).
7–8: The motif of the flickering lamp i
n the lovers’ bedroom is a familiar one in poetry.
THE CAMEL
Keśaṭa is praised by Yogeśvara in VSR 1733.
4–6: Social conventions do not allow a wife to show affection to her husband in public. Besides, her in-laws might be present. She therefore expresses her joy on seeing him on his return from a journey by treating his camel kindly, by feeding it and wiping the dust off its mane.
ALL EYES ON THE DOOR
Kṣemendra (11th cent.) was a prolific poet and critic from Kashmir whose patrons were King Ananta (r. 1029–1064) and his son, King Kalasa (r. 1064–1088) of Kashmir. His Critical Discourse on Propriety (Aucityavicāracarcā) is a landmark in Sanskrit poetics.
THE RED SEAL
Nothing is known of Kṣitīśa.
5: For fingernail marks, see note (pp. 101–102) on “That’s How I Saw Her.”
6: The “red seal” refers to his fingernail marks, and the “treasure” is the woman’s vulva, the ultimate object of the man’s desire.
ALBA
Kumāradāsa (7th–8th cent.) was the author of a long poem, The Abduction of Sita (Jānakīharaṇa). The poem is an example of the dawn song, or alba, in Sanskrit poetry. The alba is a lament over the parting of lovers at daybreak. The woman’s girlfriend warns her of the arrival of dawn with the crowing of the rooster. The lovers must now part. The poem also features the motif of stolen love. The alba appeared in Tamil earlier than it did in Sanskrit. Here is a Tamil example, “The Cockcrow,” by Allūr Naṉmullaiyār (1st–3rd cent.):
The minute the cock sounded co-coo,
panic seized my innocent heart.
Daylight fell upon us—
a sword that tore me apart
from my lover entangled in my arms.
(Kuṟuntokai [An anthology of short poems], comp. Pūrikkō, ed. U. Ve. Caminataiyar [Annamalai Nagar: Annamalai University, 1983], 309).
FURTIVE LOVEMAKING
Kuṭalā was a woman poet. This is her only poem that has survived.
2: For “betel leaves,” see note (p. 106) on “When Winter Comes.”
4: The locus classicus of the motif of stolen love is Śīlābhaṭṭārikā’s poem “Then and Now” (p. 86).
THE ART OF POETRY
Māgha (7th cent.) is best known for his long poem The Slaying of Śiśupāla (Śiśupālavadha). Compare with the following lines from the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky’s (1893–1930) poem “At the Top of My Voice” (1930):
My verse
has brought me
no roubles to spare:
no craftsmen have made
mahogany chairs for my house.
(Yevgeny Yevtushenko, comp., Twentieth-Century Russian Poetry: Silver and Steel; An Anthology, ed. Albert C. Todd and Max Hayward [New York: Doubleday, 1993], 272).
SCENT
1: For “fingernail marks,” see note (pp. 101–102) on “That’s How I Saw Her.”
2: For “the lip she has bitten,” see note (p. 102) on “A Taste of Ambrosia.”
The husband returns home at dawn to his wife, bearing the marks of his infidelity. He had probably spent the night with a courtesan.
Scents are known to have a stimulating effect, as the following lines from the Pashto poem “Lover’s Jealousy,” by the Afghan poet Mirza Rahchan Kayil (Hussein Izzat Rafi, fl. 19th cent.), show:
Oh, this scent floating from your neck, your breasts, your arms;
That circles about your thighs and your little belly;
This scent that is fed for ever and for ever
From two shady flasks under your bright arms,
I carry the scent of your body about with me.
(Edward Powys Mathers, Coloured Stars: Versions of Fifty Asiatic Love Poems [Oxford: Blackwell, 1919], 37).
Body odor was not something to be frowned upon; it was recognized as a powerful aphrodisiac. Napoléon (1769–1821) is said to have famously written to his wife, Joséphine, from Egypt, “Don’t wash, I am coming!” (Ne te lave pas, j’arrive!).
DON’T GO
Morikā was a woman poet. Nothing else is known of her.
HIDDEN FINGERNAIL MARKS
Nothing is known of Murāri (9th cent.).
4–5: Women made themselves attractive by painting figures on their faces and breasts with sandalwood paste or other fragrant substances. Compare with Kālidāsa’s The Origin of the Young God (Kumārasaṃbhava, 8.10).
HER FACE
Rājaśekhara (9th–10th cent.) was a prolific poet at the court of King Mahendrapāla of Kānyakubja. He is the author of A Study of Poetry (Kāvyamīmāṃsā).
WHAT THE YOUNG WIFE SAID TO THE TRAVELER
Rudraṭa (9th cent.) wrote one of the earliest works on poetics, Ornament in Poetry (Kāvyālaṅkāra). For a note on “traveler” poems, see the introduction, pp. xxxi–xxxiii.
GIRL DRAWING WATER FROM A WELL
Śaraṇa (12th cent.) was a poet at the court of King Lakṣmaṇasenā (r. 1179–1205) of Bengal.
2: It was not unusual for an outcaste woman, like the girl here, to not cover her breasts with a bodice. One end of the cloth was wrapped over the shoulder and often tucked in at the waist.
THE EMPTY ROAD
Nothing is known of Siddhoka. This is his only poem that has survived. The poem employs the motif of a woman whose husband is gone abroad or on a journey (proṣitabhartṛkā), one of the eight heroines of erotic poetry. The critic Viśvanātha (14th cent.) defines her thus (VSD 3.84):
The woman, who suffers the pangs of love
because her lord is away in a distant land
to further his many business interests,
is known as the “one whose husband is abroad.”
THEN AND NOW
Śīlābhaṭṭārikā was a woman poet who was, like Vidyā, probably from southern India.
3: The Vindhya mountains are a range in central India dividing the north from the south. For a reading of the poem, see the introduction, pp. xxxiv–xxxvi.
DRIVEN BY PASSION
Nothing is known of Sonnoka.
THE SMART GIRL
Śrīharṣa (12th cent.), not to be confused with King Harṣa (r. 606–647), the author of the play Ratnāvalī (A row of jewels), lived in Kānyakubja. One long poem, The Story of Nala, King of Niṣadha (Naiṣadhacarita), is attributed to him. “The Smart Girl” is similar to “She Doesn’t Let Go of Her Pride” (p. 33).
SEA OF SHAME
Vallaṇa (fl. 900–1100) was a poet from Bengal; nothing else is known of him. His poem is echoed by the Maithil poet Vidyāpati (14th–15th cent.) in the following lines of his poem “With the last of my garments”:
With the last of my garments
shame dropped from me, fluttered
to earth and lay discarded at my feet.
My lover’s body became
the only covering I needed.
(Edward C. Dimock Jr. and Denise Levertov, trans., In Praise of Krishna: Songs from the Bengali [Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1967], 27).
6: “God of love” is the translation of manasijo devaḥ (literally, “the mind-born god”), one of the epithets of Kāma. Śiva burned Kāma to ashes when the latter disturbed his meditation. He later brought him back to life when he discovered that the world was dying. In iconography, Kāma is represented as a young man with a bow and arrows tipped with flowers and riding on a parrot.
ON THE GRASS
Two travelers, a man and a woman, run into each other on the way. The woman is resting by a pond. Seeing her alone, the man comes on to her.
THE ESSENCE OF POETRY
An anonymous Telugu poem, “Not Entirely Hidden,” echoes Vallaṇa’s poem. Both poems offer a definition of poetry in terms of what is half unseen and therefore all the more seductive—a woman’s “half-uncovered breasts.”
Not entirely hidden,
like the enormous breasts of those Gujarati women,
and not open to view,
like a Tamil woman’s breasts,
but rather,
/>
like the supple, half-uncovered breasts
of a Telugu girl,
neither concealed nor exposed:
that’s how a poem should be composed.
Anything else
is a joke.
(Velcheru Narayana Rao and David Shulman, trans., A Poem at the Right Moment: Remembered Verses from Premodern South India [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998], 33).
PORING OVER A BOOK
Nothing is known of Varāha. Compare with the Chinese poet Bai Juyi’s (772–846) poem “Old Age,” especially the following lines:
The dull eye is closed ere night comes;
The idle head, still uncombed at noon.
Propped on a staff, sometimes a walk abroad;
Or all day sitting with closed doors.
One dares not look in the mirror’s polished face;
One cannot read small-letter books.
(Arthur Waley, Translations from the Chinese [New York: Knopf, 1941], 253).
HOLLOW PLEASURES
Vidyā, Vijjā, or Vijjakā (fl. 7th–9th cent.) was a woman poet. Nothing else is known of her. It is possible that she was from southern India, as the following poem (JS 4.96) from Bhagadatta Jalhaṇa’s A String of Pearls of Fine Verses (Sūktimuktāvalī, 13th cent.) by her suggests:
Not knowing me, Vijjakā,
dark as the petal of the blue lotus,
it is quite foolish of Daṇḍin to say
the Goddess of Poetry is white.
Vidyā claimed to be the goddess of poetry, Sarasvatī incarnate, a claim endorsed by the poet Rājaśekhara, who praised her as the “Kannada goddess of speech” (JS 4.93). Daṇḍin (7th cent.) was a poet at the court of the Pallava king Narasiṃhavarman I (r. 630–668) of Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu. He is best known for his prose narrative Tales of the Ten Princes (Daśakumāracarita), and for an influential work on poetics, The Mirror of Poetry (Kāvyādarśa). Vidyā was an exceptional woman who probably enjoyed royal patronage.
COMPLAINT
For a reading of the poem, see the introduction, pp. xxiv–xxvi.
THE RIVERBANK
The woman anticipates the marks of her lover’s fingernails on her breasts as she sets out to meet him under the pretext of fetching water from the river for her husband. A wife is expected to be faithful to her husband. The poem subverts that expectation. The poet resorts to innuendo (vyañjanā) to refer to the wife’s infidelity. She does not spell it out, since it would offend social conventions. The image of the “reeds/whose broken shoots may scrape against my breasts” is a metaphor for the lover’s fingernail marks on her breasts. For fingernail marks, see note (pp. 101–102) on “That’s How I Saw Her.”