Selected Poems (Tagore, Rabindranath)

by Rabindranath Tagore

  Hindusthāni (84, 133) Someone from Hindi-speaking North India, as opposed to Bengal.

  Holi (54) Hindu spring and fertility festival, characterized by the joyous throwing of coloured powders and sprinkling of coloured liquids at people.

  Indra (89, 113, 155) King of the gods in the Rg-veda, most ancient of Indian texts; the Indian Jupiter, lord of the sky whose thunderbolt conquers demons. In Kālidāsa’s Kumāra-sambhava he sends Kāma to try to break Śiva’s penance (see Kālidāsa).

  Jabā (68, 144) Hibiscus; it grows on a bushy plant, is bell-shaped, and is generally scarlet, though other colours are found. It can bloom nearly all the year round, and one of its varieties is used in the worship of Kālī.

  Jāhnavī (131) Name of Gagā (the Ganges): ‘daughter of Jahnu’ after a sage of that name who was disturbed by the river and drank her up in anger; but who later relented and allowed her to flow from his ear.

  Jambu (51, 180) Large tree that sheds its leaves in January/February, has fragrant white flowers in March-May, and purplish-black astringent fruit in June/July. Fruit, bark and seeds have medicinal properties; tussore silk-worms are fed on the leaves

  .

  Jārul (119) Pride of India; deciduous tree, whose leaves fall in February/March after turning red. It has showy mauve or pink flowers growing in clusters, and green fruit turning to woody-brown and not eaten. Its wood is valuable, and its bark, leaves and fruits have medicinal properties.

  Jātī (94) Jasmine; its small star-shaped white or yellow flowers, growing on a shrub, are especially sweet-scented at night, and are profuse in spring and summer. An extract from the flowers is used to make medicines and perfumed hair-oil. The jātī is also commonly known as cāmelī q.v.).

  Jayadeva (51) Sanskrit poet of the early twelfth century A.D., born in Bengal. His best known work is the Gita-govinda, ‘Song of the Cowherd’, a voluptuous poetic drama about Rādhā and Ksa.

  Jiban-debatā (7, 8, 61) See Introduction 35, 38, and notes to ‘The Golden Boat’, ‘On the Edge of the Sea’, ‘Unyielding’ and ‘Last Tryst’ (136, 158, 170).

  Jumna (Yamunā) (80) River of North India, one of the ‘holy triad’ (Gagā, Yamunā and Sarasvati) Delhi is on its banks, and the Taj Mahal at Agra.

  Jyaistha (135) Second month of the Bengali year, mid-May to mid-June; high summer in Bengal.

  Kacu (116) The taro, a coarse herbaceous plant cultivated for its tubers; also the dasheen, ornamental varieties of which are planted in gardens (and known in India as Bleeding Heart).

  Kadam/Kadamba (67, 139) Flower growing on a large tree, with tiny florets set on a yellow-orange ball. It is sweet-scented, grows in the rainy season, is associated with Ksna and is therefore celebrated in Vaiava poetry.

  Kāfi (54) Musical rāga, spelt kāphi in Bengali (the name is Persian). It is mostly used in lighter forms of composition such as humrī.

  Kailāsa (180) A great Himalayan peak, said to be the abode of Śiva as well as the site of the Yaka city of Alakā.

  Kālī (144) The most frightening of the forms of Śiva’s śakti or consort, with an important cult in Bengal centred in the Kalighat Temple in Calcutta. Tagore attacked Kālī-worship in his play bisarjan (Sacrifice), 1890.

  Kālidāsa (38, 120, 130, 131, 151, 165, 169, 173, 180) Greatest poet and dramatist of Sanskrit literature, who lived some time between A.D. 350 and 600. Little is known about him: he is traditionally supposed to have been the most brilliant of the ‘nine gems’ of literature at the court of Vikramāditya in Ujjain. The works of Kālidāsa that had the greatest influence on Tagore were the Meghadūta (Cloud-Messenger) and the Kumāra-sambhava (Kumāra’s Occasioning, usually known as ‘The Birth of the War-god’). The Meghadūta is in the form of a message from an exiled Yaka in Central India to his pining Beloved in the Yaka city of Alakā on Mount Kailāsa, sent on a cloud. The poem gives a bird’s eye view of India as the Yaka imagines the cloud’s progress northwards. The romanticism and yearning of the poem, rather than its worldliness and wit, were what appealed to Tagore. The Kumāra-sambhava is based on a major Hindu myth: the gods, in terror of the demon Tāraka, are told by Brahmā that the demon can only be destroyed by the son of Śiva begotten on Pārvatī. Śiva is at the time engaged in deep meditation, so Indra, chief of the gods, persuades Kāma, the god of Love, to smite Śiva with love for Pārvatī. Kāma’s first attempt fails: Śiva, discharges a flame from his third eye and burns Kāma to ashes. Later Śiva relents, restores Kāma, and marries Pārvatī (Umā). In the seventh canto of the poem the wedding is flamboyantly described, with the saptari, the Seven Sages of Ancient India, in attendance.

  Kāma (90, 151, 156) Indian god of Love, husband of Rati. His bow is made of sugar-cane strung with a row of bees, and his arrows are flowers. He emerged from the primeval chaos, and has no parents. For the story of how he was sent as ‘Indra’s messenger’ to try to break Śiva’s penance, so that the universe could be saved from the demon Tāraka, see Kālidāsa.

  Kanakhala (52,131) Mountain, near to which the flow of the Ganges was checked by Śiva’s hair. See Ganges

  .

  Kāñcan (88) White, pinkish-mauve or yellow flower growing on a small tree, lightly scented, growing more or less round the year.

  Karabi/Karabikā (129, 152) Oleander; white, dark pink or red flower, growing in bunches on a large shrub. It has a faint, pleasant smell and blooms throughout the year.

  Ketaki (51, 67, 180) Screw-pine; long spiked leaves covering floral stalks whose pollen is used as a flavouring for pān (q.v.), drinks, etc. It is strongly scented, and blooms in the rainy season.

  Khasrubāg (86) Name of a palace at Rampur in Uttar Pradesh; but Tagore may not have had a precise place in mind when he used the name in ‘Deception’.

  Kimśuk (88) Flame of the Forest; tree with bright orange-red flowers like a parrot’s beak, growing in clusters. It is not scented, but flowers profusely in spring, and is associated with spring festivals.

  Kirāt (136) An ancient forest people living in the eastern Himalayas. The name has come to mean simply ‘aboriginal’ (ādi-bāsi) or ‘tribal’ in Tagore.

  Koel (kokil) (47, 119, 172) A bird that is frequently called ‘cuckoo’ by translators but which is actually different from either the European cuckoo or the Indian cuckoo, though it belongs to the same order. Its call is much more strident and high-pitched than the cuckoo’s note.

  Ka (54, 128, 131, 144, 180, 182) Celebrated incarnation of Viu and hero of Hindu mythology. In Bengal he is associated with Vaiavism and the countless medieval Bengali lyrics that celebrate the love of Ka and Rādhā; and with his upbringing in Vraja on the banks of the Jumna in the company of cowherds and milkmaids. Both traditions appear in the Gīta-govinda of Jayadeva, Bengal’s greatest Sanskrit poet. Ka is dark in complexion and is sometimes called Śyām (‘black’ or ‘dark blue or green’).

  Kumāra-sambhava (151,165) See Kālidāsa.

  Kunda (146) Small white flower growing on a small shrub, unscented, blooming especially profusely in spring. Poets liken the flower to beautiful teeth.

  Kuci (110) White-flowering tree; its whitish timber is used for woodcuts and engraving.

  Kuruketra (52) Plain near Delhi, celebrated as the site of the great battle between the Kau-ravas and Pandavas in the Mahābhārata.

  Lakmī (46, 52, 85, 134, 135) Goddess of fortune and beauty, wife of Vinu. She is associated with prosperity, goodness and happiness, and with the lotus, which she carries in her hand. laksmī is an adjective meaning well-behaved and good-natured in Bengali; and laksmī-chāā means ‘good-for-nothing’.

  Lāhi (68) A stick or staff for fighting with; policeman’s baton in modern usage.

  Līlā (88, 89, 155, 163, 166,171) See notes to ‘The Wakening of Śiva’, p. 152.

  Mādhabī (78, 90, 146) Creeper with bunches of light-red, pink or (rarely) light-yellow flowers, with a faint, very pleasant smell. It blooms from February to September.

  Mahuā (155) Indian Butter tree: its transparent, light-cream flowe
rs exude a scent of honey, bloom from February to April, and yield a spirit drunk freely by San-thals and other aboriginal groups. Its seeds are crushed for oil (hence its English name), and its sap is used as a cure for rheumatism. Its green, juicy berries are also intoxicating, and are liked by birds and animals.

  Makara (94, 95) Mythical sea-monster, representing the Capricorn of the Hindu zodiac, with head and forelegs of a deer, and body and tail of a fish. It figures on the banner of Kāma, god of Love.

  Mālatī (139) Creeper with white flowers growing in cascading bunches, beautifully perfumed. It blooms from June to August, and is celebrated in poetry.

  Mānasa Lake (46, 52, 129, 181, 182) Sacred lake in the Himalayas, near Mount Kailāsa. The Yaksa city of Alakā and the abode where the Yaka’s Beloved pines for him in Kālidāsa’s Meghadūta are on its shore.

  Mandāra (137) Coral tree: with beautiful clusters of coral-red flowers that blossom when the leaves are shed. It is also regarded as one of the seven trees of svarga-loka, most popular of the paradises of Hindu cosmology.

  Mantra (60, 88, 131, 136, 152, 154, 161, 172, 175, 178) This term was originally restricted to the metrical psalms of praise in Vedic literature; but it came to mean any sacred verse of scripture or any spell or formula used in worship, prayer or ritual. The most famous mantra of all is the Gāyatri, a verse from the Rg-veda that all Brahmins are supposed to repeat mentally morning and evening. The importance of mantras to India’s many esoteric and mystical cults gives the word connotations of magic as well as prayer.

  Meghadūta (50, 51, 79, 130, 146, 169, 180, 181, 184)

  See Kālidāsa.

  Moghul (122, 146, 174)

  Muslim dynasty founded by Babur in 1526, which ruled much of India until European adventurism and internal weaknesses began to break up the Moghul empire in the eighteenth century.

  Mohenjodaro (110, 111, 165) A site in Sind, Pakistan, which has given its name to a prehistoric civilization that flourished in the Indus Valley from about 2500 to 1500 B.C.

  Mūltān (54) Musical rāga, usually known as Mūltānī. It is quiet, loving and associated with late afternoon.

  Nadiyā (Nabadwīp) (118) Town and district in West Bengal; a major cultural and religious centre in the Bengali middle ages.

  Nirvindhyā (51, 180) A river flowing north from the Vindhya mountains in Central India

  .

  Oiyā (57) A native of the state of Orissa, south of Bengal.

  Pān (54) Leaf of the betel pepper plant, commonly chewed in India together with betel-nut (which comes from a different plant, the betel palm) and shell lime, with spices added to taste.

  Pānā (164) A pond-weed. Some varieties, such as the Water Hyacinth, have flowers; some are dried and used as a fertilizer.

  Pārul (86, 150) Large brick-red bell-shaped flowers on a small tree, sweet-scented, blooming from April to June.

  Pārvatī (94, 95, 131, 156, 157) Consort of Śiva. She was born of a union between Himavat (see Himālaya) and the nymph Menakā, and her name therefore means ‘daughter of the mountain’. She tends to appear in Tagore’s writings as Śiva’s śakti manifest in Nature.

  Pāthān (122, 174) The tribesmen inhabiting the ‘North-West Frontier’ region between present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan. The term was sometimes applied to the Delhi sultans (1206–1526), though most of the dynasties of the sultanate were of Turkish origin.

  Pau (136) Bengali winter month, mid-December to mid-January; time of the most important Melā or fair held at Santiniketan (see Bāul).

  Phālgun (101) Bengali month, mid-February to mid-March; the first part of spring.

  Pināka (46) The name of Śiva’s bow (though some say it is the name of his trident).

  Praām (138, 160) Act of obeisance. Before a deity, one touches the ground with one’s forehead; with a respected person, one touches the feet and then one’s forehead (‘taking the dust’ of his or her feet).

  Pūjā (94, 108) General word for most forms of ceremonial worship, from a simple daily offering to a deity to a full-scale religious festival such as Bengal’s Durgā-pūjā. It is probably derived from a verb meaning ‘smear, put on sticky substances, daub’, since a major part of pūjā is the marking or daubing of the image of the deity with various liquids, powders and oily substances (usually red or yellow).

  Pūrvi (58, 150) Musical rāga. It is quiet and serious, and is performed at sunset.

  Rādhā (180) A celebrated cowherdess beloved of Ka; she features greatly in Jayadeva’s Gīta-govinda, and in the numerous padas (lyric songs) of Bengali Vaiavism. She became the archetypal Bengali birahii (woman separated from and pining for the one she loves).

  Rāga (54, 58, 90, 98, 107, 133, 152, 158, 163) The most important term and element in Indian music. It is derived from the Sanskrit word raga, ‘colour’. Modern Indian languages generally drop the final ‘a’ in pronunciation, so I have written rāg Pūrvī, rāg Kāfi etc. in my translations. A rāga is a group of notes on which a musical composition or improvisation may be based, and carries a distinguishing name. Traditionally each rāga is associated with a particular mood, time of day, season, etc.; and conservative musicians will only reluctantly perform a rāga at the wrong time. There have been several different systems of classifying rāgas according to a limited number of parent scales. Tagore, when he refers to rāgas in his poems, usually observes another classification which became popular in North India: in this, some of the rāgas are called rāginīs (feminine rāgas), subordinated to a small number of male rāgas. The distinction is not often maintained in current speech.

  Rajanī-gandhā (144)

  Small lily-like bulbiferous plant, with white flowers growing along a long stalk. Its name means ‘night-scented’, and it is used in bouquets at weddings or to decorate the bridal bed.

  Rājbamśī (119) A subdivision of the Māl caste of Bengal: the Māls are supposed to have been aboriginal, non-Aryan cultivators, later absorbed into the lower Hindu castes. But the term Rājbamśī or Rajbanshi is not precise, has been claimed by other tribal groups (it literally means ‘of royal lineage’) and can simply mean ‘low-caste’.

  Rāmagiri (180) ‘Rāma’s mountain’ in Central India, where Rāma, hero of the Sanskrit epic the Rāmāyaa, began a fourteen-year period of exile.

  Revā (51, 180, 182) Sacred river flowing westwards from Mount Ämrakūa in the Vindhya mountains.

  Rūpnārāya (65) A river of West Bengal, a tributary of the Hooghly, joining it from the west near its mouth It is fully tidal, and a danger when in flood to the navigation of the Hooghly.

  Sādhu (56, 57, 134) Term for an ascetic or sannyāsī; but also a term for a merchant, trader or money-lender – or simply a prosperous and respected man.

  Śahānā (54) Musical rāga, usually known as Sahānā,-kānadā. It is solemn, and is sung in the third quarter of the night.

  Sajne (93) Tree with small white flowers growing in clusters, flowering from March to April and faintly perfumed.

  Śakti (141, 144, 145, 154) The energy or active power of a deity personified as his wife. The śakti or consort of a god can take many forms; thus Durgā, Kālī and Pārvatī are all śaktis of Śiva. The word can also simply mean ‘power, strength, might’.

  Sannyāsī (121, 135, 155) An ascetic or monk or religious mendicant.

  Sealdah Station (97)

  The main railway terminus in North Calcutta.

  Sēuti (88) A sort of dog-rose; white, with a single row of petals.

  Shah-Jahan (78, 145, 146) Fifth Moghul Emperor, from 1628 to 1658, famous for the Peacock Throne he built for himself and for the magnificent buildings of his capital, Agra. The Taj Mahal, a tomb for his wife Mumtaz Mahal, took over twenty years to build.

  Siddha (51) Name of a class of semi-divine beings who dwell high up, in mountains or in the sky between earth and sun.

  Sindhu-Bārōyā (98) Musical rāga, favoured by Tagore and the Vishnupuri group of musicians; a version of the light rāga Bārvā.

  Siprā (51
, 180, 181, 182) River on whose banks Ujjayinī is situated.

  Śiśu (84) Tree, whose off-white flowers bloom in the rainy season. Its wood is used for making furniture. Known as the Shisham tree in North and Central India.

  Śiuli (86) Night jasmine: small white flowers with orange stalks, blossoming at night and dropping in showers by early morning. It is sweet-scented, and blooms from September to November.

  Śiva (46, 47, 52, 58, 70, 89, 90, 94, 95, 129, 131, 135, 141, 151, 152, 156, 157, 161, 163, 165) Third god of the Hindu triad, and the richest and most contradictory of the three. He is frequently referred to as ‘The Destroyer’ (as opposed to Brahmā the Creator and Viu the Preserver), and in this capacity has a fearsome aspect – with a serpent and necklace of skulls round his neck, a central eye that can shoot out flame, and a train of attendant demons who frequent cremation-grounds. His dance, the tádava, destroys the world, and in this form he is known as Naa-rāj, Lord of the Dance. But he is also associated with fertility, the Liga or Phallus being the main form in which he is worshipped in Śiva-temples; and the unity of Śiva and his śakti or consort (Pārvatī, Durgā, Kālī represents the perfect balancing of opposing forces in Nature. Śiva’s periods of activity and creativity are interrupted by spells of deep meditation or penance: in this form he is ‘The Great Ascetic’, ash-smeared, bark-clad, destroyer of the god of Love Kāma with a glance of fire from his eye. Śiva’s hair is matted together and coiled up above his forehead; on the top of it he bears the Ganges(q.v.). He holds in his eight hands a trident called triśūla, whose three prongs denote his creative, destructive and regenerative powers, a drum (damaru), a bow (pināka), and a horn (usually a conch). He is ac-ompanied by the bull Nandin. He has over a thousand names and epithets.