I Won't Let You Go (35 page)

Where’s the light? Where, where is the light?

Kindle it in separation’s blaze!

          A lamp exists, but has no flame –

          was this written in my fate?

Death, surely, would be better than this state!

Light the lamp in separation’s blaze!

Pain, she-messenger, croons:

‘Listen, soul, for your sake God wakes,

          in deepest darkness

          calls you to keep love’s tryst,

tests you with affliction to uphold your nobleness.

For your sake God wakes!’

The dome of the heavens has filled with heaps of clouds,

the rain continues to fall, does not abate.

    In such a night for what

    does my soul awake with a start

feeling tender yearning’s sudden onslaught?

The rain continues to fall, does not abate.

The lightning’s gleam just casts a moment’s brightness,

only to plunge the eyes in denser darkness.

           Far away – don’t know exactly where –

           a melody in bass notes commences,

tugging all my soul towards the road’s distance,

plunging the eyes in even denser darkness.

Where’s the light? Where, where is the light?

Kindle it in separation’s blaze!

          The thunder calls. Loudly the tempest bawls.

          If the hour is missed, the tryst will not be kept.

Well-advanced and touchstone-black is the night.

Light love’s lamp with your soul, let it blaze!

It is a stormy night

and you are coming to meet me,

o my friend, my soul-mate!

The sky weeps like

someone in despair,

my eyes know no sleep.

Beloved, I throw open my door

and look out again and again.

O my friend, my soul-mate!

Outside I can see

nothing at all, nothing!

I wonder what kind of

track you might be treading.

Along the bank of

what distant river,

skirting the edge of

what dense-knit forest,

in what depth of darkness

are you coming across,

o my friend, my soul-mate!

O master singer, how marvellously you sing!

All I can do is listen to you, entranced.

Melody’s light overspreads the earth’s expanse,

gales of melody scale the sky’s ramparts;

bursting rocks, melody’s Ganga flows

torrential in its speed.

In my heart of hearts I wish to sing like you,

but such rich notes elude my vocal cords.

I want to say something, but falter in my speech.

I am trumped! My inmost being weeps.

What a trap this is, where I find myself ensnared,

with your web of melodies woven all around me!

No! It won’t do to evade me like this!

Steal secretly into my heart’s seat:

nobody will know it, or talk about it!

No matter where I roam, abroad or at home,

your game of hide-and-seek is patent to me.

            Say now

you won’t trick me,

will let yourself be caught

in an obscure corner of my mind’s retreat!

It won’t do to evade me like this!

Yes, yes, my heart is hard, I know,

not soft enough for your feet!

Yet should your breeze blow upon it, friend,

wouldn’t it thaw a bit?

I may lack self-discipline’s grit,

but should your tender mercy’s droplets fall,

wouldn’t blossoms unfold in an instant,

fruits ripen, too, in a sudden burst of heat?

It won’t do to evade me like this!

If I don’t see you, Lord, in this life,

let me remember that fact –

that I never had the chance to meet and get to know you.

Let me not forget it. Let it hurt my sleep and dreams.

I may spend days in this world’s market-place,

my two hands may get piled with stupendous riches.

Yet let me remember that I haven’t gained anything at all.

Let me not forget it. Let it hurt my sleep and dreams.

If I sit down idly on the road,

carefully spread my bed-roll in the dust,

let me remember all my paths are still untrod.

Let me not forget it. Let it hurt my sleep and dreams.

No matter how loudly peals of laughter ring

or how long the flute plays in my house,

no matter how lavishly I decorate all the rooms,

let me remember that I haven’t had you as my guest.

Let me not forget it. Let it hurt my sleep and dreams.

My eyes keep vigil for you, Lord,

           but I don’t see you.

                       I scan the road:

           and I like that too!

                      Sitting in the dust by the gate,

                      my beggar’s heart

                                  solicits your mercy, alas!

                                              Your pity I don’t get,

                                                          I just ask for it:

                                              and I like that too!

Today in this world

so many, so busy, so happy,

             have rushed past me and sped ahead of me.

                          I can’t find a companion,

                                    it’s
you
I want:

                          and I like that too!              

                          Around me the green

                          yearning honeyed earth

                                      draws from me such tears of tenderness!

                                      No sign of you, none!

                                               O yes, it hurts:

                                      but I like that too!

My heart’s ravisher,

            this is your love indeed:

this light’s golden dance

            upon the leaves!

                       These clouds, sweetly sluggish,

                       drifting in the heavens,

                       this breeze dripping manna

                                   on my skin:

                       my heart’s ravisher,

                                   these are your love indeed!

Streams of morning light

            have flooded my eyes.

Your words of love

            have entered my inmost being.

                        I’ve seen your face bend down

                        and fix its gaze on my face.

                        Today my heart has touched

                                    your very feet.

For how many aeons

            have you been coming towards me –

            to be united with me!

Where possibly could your suns and moons

            keep you hidden!

                       In the mornings and evenings

                       of how many ages

            have your footsteps reverberated!

            And a secret messenger

                       has etched your call on my breast!

O wayfarer,

            today in all my being

I think I sense

            joy’s fitful shivers.

            It is as if the hour had finally come,

                       and all I had to do was at last done.

                       O great king, how the wind does blow

                       with your perfume on itself!

The song I came to sing here stays unsung.

It’s still the scales, just the wish carrying me along.

I haven’t yet hit the notes. I haven’t yet fixed the words.

Within me there’s just a song’s disquiet.

The bud’s still closed. Just a breath of air has stirred.

I haven’t yet seen his face. I haven’t yet heard his speech.

From time to time I just hear his pacing feet.

He comes and goes just without my door.

The whole day’s gone in just preparing a seat.

My room’s unlit. How can I ask him in?

I hope to have him, for I haven’t had him yet.

That is why

you take such pleasure in me,

why you have come down!

Lord of the three worlds,

were it not for me,

your love would have been naught!

Here with me

you have framed a fairground’s play;

inside my heart the emotions are swaying;

within my life in diverse manifestations

your will is in wave motion.

That is why,

though you are a king of kings,

you still seek my heart

and wander in such captivating costumes,

always alert.

That is why

it is your love that pours

in the love of one who adores:

it is where two are united

that your likeness

is fully manifest.

All life’s acts of worship

           not completed –

even those, I know,

           aren’t utterly lost, forfeited.

The flower that fell to earth

before opening its eye,

the river that lost its way

           in desert sands – 

even those, I know,

           aren’t utterly lost, forfeited.

Jobs undone that

           trail behind me still –

I don’t believe

           they’ll only add up to nil.

I hear them ring

on your own lute-strings,

which I haven’t reached

           or plucked with my fingers yet.

I just don’t believe

they’re totally trashed, defeated.

She won’t take no for an answer.

I look away. She says, ‘No, no, no!’

I tell her, ‘It’s day. The lamp is pale.’

Her eyes on my face, she says, ‘No, no, no!’

Wild and flustered in the blustering wind,

Phalgun yawls in the flower-garden.

I tell her, ‘Well then, time for me to go.’

She stands at the door, says, ‘No, no, no!’

The dawn in which you called me

                       is known to none.

That my mind weeps to itself

                       is allowed by none.

Restless, I stalk

and stare at others’ faces.

Traction such as yours

                       is matched by none.

The fifth note quakes,

the shuttered room vibrates.

But, without, my door

                       is knocked by none.

Whose unquiet in the sky

and news in the wind that flies?

Along this path that secret

                       is borne by none.

When my pain escorts me to your door,

come, open the door yourself and call her in.

Starved of your arms, all else has she forsworn

and runs to meet you along a path of thorns.

When pain plucks my strings, my notes vibrate.

That song pulls you so, you gravitate.

It flounders down like a bird in a night of storm.

Come you then. Come out into the darkness.