Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE INDIAN SONG OF SONGS (GITA GOVINDA): SARGA THE FIRST, by JAYADEVA


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THE INDIAN SONG OF SONGS (GITA GOVINDA): SARGA THE FIRST, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Beautiful radha, jasmine-bosomed radha
Last Line: (here ends that sarga of the gîta govinda entitled samodadamodaro.)
Subject(s): Beauty; Soul


SAMODADAMODARO.

THE SPORTS OF KRISHNA.

Beautiful Radha, jasmine-bosomed Radha,
All in the Spring-time waited by the wood
For Krishna fair, Krishna the all-forgetful,—
Krishna with earthly love's false fire consuming—
And some one of her maidens sang this song:—

(What follows is to the Music VASANTA and the Mode YATI.)

I know where Krishna tarries in these early days of Spring.
When every wind from warm Malay brings fragrance on its wing;
Brings fragrance stolen far away from thickets of the clove,
In jungles where the bees hum and the Koïl flutes her love;
He dances with the dancers, of a merry morrice one,
All in the budding Spring-time, for 'tis sad to be alone.

I know how Krishna passes these hours of blue and gold,
When parted lovers sigh to meet and greet and closely hold
Hand fast in hand; and every branch upon the Vakul-tree
Droops downward with a hundred blooms, in every bloom a bee;
He is dancing with the dancers to a laughter-moving tone,
In the soft awakening Spring-time, when 'tis hard to live alone.

Where Kroona-flowers, that open at a lover's lightest tread,
Break, and, for shame at what they hear, from white blush modest red;
And all the spears on all the boughs of all the Ketuk-glades
Seem ready darts to pierce the hearts of wandering youths and maids;
'Tis there thy Krishna dances till the merry drum is done,
All in the sunny Spring-time, when who can live alone?

Where the breaking forth of blossom on the yellow Keshra-sprays
Dazzles like Kama's scepter, whom all the world obeys;
And Pâtal-buds fill drowsy bees from pink delicious bowls,
As Kama's nectared goblet steeps in languor human souls;
There he dances with the dancers, and of Radha thinketh none,
All in the warm new Spring-tide, when none will live alone.

Where the breath of waving Mâdhvi pours incense through the grove,
And silken Mogras lull the sense with essences of love,—
The silken-soft pale Mogra, whose perfume fine and faint
Can melt the coldness of a maid, the sternness of a saint—
There dances with those dancers thine other self, thine Own,
All in the languorous Spring-time, when none will live alone.
Where—as if warm lips touched sealed eyes and waked them—all the bloom

Opens upon the mangoes to feel the sunshine come;
And Atimuktas wind their arms of softest green about,
Clasping the stems, while calm and clear great Jumna spreadeth out;
There dances and there laughs thy Love, with damsels many an one,
In the rosy days of Spring-time, for he will not live alone.

Mark this song of Jayadev!
Deep as pearl in ocean-wave
Lurketh in its lines a wonder
Which the wise alone will ponder:
Though it seemeth of the earth,
Heavenly is the music's birth;
Telling darkly of delights
In the wood, of wasted nights,
Of witless days, and fruitless love, And false pleasures of
the grove,
And rash passions of the prime,
And those dances of Spring-time;
Time, which seems so subtle-sweet,—
Time, which pipes to dancing-feet,
Ah! so softly—ah! so sweetly—
That among those wood-maids featly
Krishna can not choose but dance,
Letting pass life's greater chance.

Yet the winds that sigh so
As they stir the rose,
Wake a sigh from Krishna
Wistfuller than those;
All their faint breaths swinging
The creepers to and fro
Pass like rustling arrows
Shot from Kama's bow:
Thus among the dancers
What those zephyrs bring
Strikes to Krishna's spirit
Like a darted sting.

And all as if — far wandered—
The traveler should hear
The bird of home, the KoïUl,
With nest-notes rich and clear;
And there should come one moment
A blessèd fleeting dream
Of the bees among the mangoes
Beside his native stream;
So flash those sudden yearnings,
That sense of a dearer thing,
The love and lack of Radha
Upon his soul in Spring.

Then she, the maid of Radha, spake again;
And pointing far away between the leaves
Guided her lovely Mistress where to look,
And note how Krishna wantoned in the wood,
Now with this one, now that; his heart, her prize,
Panting with foolish passions, and his eyes
Beaming with too much love for those fair girls —
Fair, but not so as Radha; and she sang:

(What follows is to the Music RAMAGIRÎand the Mode YATI.)

See, Lady! how thy Krishna passes these idle hours
Decked forth in fold of woven gold, and crowned with forest flowers;
And scented with the sandal, and gay with gems of price—
Rubies to mate his laughing lips, and diamonds like his eyes;—
In the company of damsels, who dance and sing and play,
Lies Krishna, laughing, toying, dreaming his Spring away.

One, with star-blossomed champak wreathed, wooes him to rest his head
On the dark pillow of her breast so tenderly outspread,
And o'er his brow with roses blown she fans a fragrance rare,
That falls on the enchanted sense like rain in thirsty air,
While the company of damsels wave many an odorous spray,
And Krishna, laughing, toying, sighs the soft Spring away.

Another, gazing in his face, sits wistfully apart,
Searching it with those looks of love that leap from heart to heart;
Her eyes — afire with shy desire, veiled by their lashes black—
Speak so that Krishna can not choose but send the message back,
In the company of damsels whose bright eyes in a ring
Shine round him with soft meanings in the merry light of Spring.

The third one of that dazzling band of dwellers in the wood —
Body and bosom panting with the pulse of youthful blood —
Leans over him, as in his ear a lightsome thing to speak,
And then with leaf-soft lip imprints a kiss below his cheek;
A kiss that thrills, and Krishna turns at the silken touch
To, give it back—ah, Radha! forgetting thee too much.

And one with arch smile beckons him away from Jumna's banks,
Where the tall bamboos bristle like spears in battle-ranks,
And plucks his cloth to make him come into the mango-shade,
Where the fruit is ripe and golden, and the milk and cakes are laid:
Oh, golden-red the mangoes, and glad the feasts of Spring,
And fair the flowers to lie upon, and sweet the dancers sing.

Sweetest of all that Temptress who dances for him now
With subtle feet which part and meet in the Râsmeasure slow,
To the chime of silver bangles and the beat of rose-leaf hands,
And pipe and lute and cymbal played by the woodland bands;
So that wholly passion-laden—eye, ear, sense, soul o'ercome—
Krishna is theirs in the forest; his heart forgets its home.

Krishna, made for heavenly things,
'Mid those woodland singers sings;
With those dancers dances featly,
Gives back soft embraces sweetly;
Smiles on that one, toys with this,
Glance for glance and kiss for kiss;
Meets the merry damsels fairly,
Plays the round of folly rarely,
Lapped in milk-warm spring-time weather,
He and those brown girls together.

And this shadowed earthly love
In the twilight of the grove,
Dance and song and soft caresses,
Meeting looks and tangled tresses,
Jayadev the same hath writ,
That ye might have gain of it,
Sagely its deep sense conceiving
And its inner light believing;
How that Love—the mighty Master,
Lord of all the stars that cluster
In the sky, swiftest and slowest,
Lord of highest Lord of lowest—
Manifests himself to mortals,
Winning them toward the portals Of his secret House, the gates
Of that bright Paradise which waits
The wise in love. Ah, human creatures!
Even your phantasies are teachers.
Mighty Love makes sweet in seeming
Even Krishna's woodland dreaming;
Mighty Love sways all alike
From self to selflessness. Oh, strike
From your eyes the veil, and see
What Love willeth Him to be.
Who in error, but in grace,
Sitteth with that lotus-face,
And those eyes whose rays of heaven
Unto phantom-eyes are given;
Holding feasts of foolish mirth
With these Visions of the earth;
Learning love, and love imparting;
Yet with sense of loss upstarting:—
For the cloud that veils the fountains
Underneath the Sandal mountains,
How—as if the sunshine drew
All its being to the blue—
It takes flight, and seeks to rise
High into the purer skies,
High into the snow and frost,
On the shining summits lost!
Ah, and how the Koïl's strain
Smites the traveler with pain,—
When the mango blooms in spring,
And "Koohoo," "Koohoo," they sing—
Pain of pleasures not yet won,
Pain of journeys not yet done,
Pain of toiling without gaining,
Pain, 'mid gladness, of still paining.

But may He guide us all to glory high,
Who laughed when Radha glided, hidden, by,
And all among those damsels free and bold
Touched Krishna with a soft mouth, kind and cold;
And like the others, leaning on his breast,
Unlike the others, left there Love's unrest;
And like the others, joining in his song,
Unlike the others, made him silent long.

(Here ends that Sarga of the Gîta Govinda entitled SAMODADAMODARO.)





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