On the day when the lotus bloomed, alas, my mind was straying,

I may not find a place in thy garland, but honour it with a touch ofpain from thy hand and pluck it. I fear lest the day end before I amaware, and the time of offering go by.Though its colour be not deep and its smell be faint, use this flowerin thy service and pluck…

from the village near by.It was noon. The children’s playtime was over; the ducks inthe pond were silent.The shepherd boy lay asleep under the shadow of the banyantree.The crane stood grave and still in the swamp near the mangogrove.In the meanwhile the Sleep-stealer came and, snatching sleepfrom baby’s eyes, flew away.When mother came back she…

your arms for your baby in the bed, I shall say, ‘Baby is nothere!’-mother, I am going.I shall become a delicate draught of air and caress you andI shall be ripples in the water when you bathe, and kiss you andkiss you again.In the gusty night when the rain patters on the leaves youwill hear…

Let the dead have the immortality of fame,but the living the immortality of love.Life’s errors cry for the merciful beautythat can modulate their isolation into aharmony with the whole.Life, like a child, laughs,shaking its rattle of death as it runs.

are false and empty to the core.As the night keeps hidden in its gloom the petition for light,even thus in the depth of my unconsciousness rings the cry—`I want thee, only thee’.As the storm still seeks its end in peacewhen it strikes against peace with all its might,even thus my rebellion strikes against thy loveand…

Every morning this dog, very attached to me,Quietly keeps sitting near my seatTill touching its headI recognize its company.This recognition gives it so much joyPure delight ripples through its entire body.Among all dumb creaturesIt is the only living beingThat has seen the whole manBeyond what is good or bad in himIt has seenFor his love…

You say it is only twelve o’clock. Suppose it isn’t any later;can’t you ever think it is afternoon when it is only twelveo’clock?I can easily imagine now that the sun has reached the edge ofthat rice-field, and the old fisher-woman is gathering herbs forher supper by the side of the pond.I can just shut my…

streets and the stars.When we play at eating with pebbles, she thinks they are realfood, and tries to put them into her mouth.When I open a book before her and ask her to learn her a, b,c, she tears the leaves with her hands and roars for joy atnothing; this is your baby’s way of…

We have trysts to keep in the darkness, but whereor with whom – of that we are unaware.But we have this faith – that a lifetime’s blisswill appear any minute, with a smile upon its lips.Scents, touches, sounds, snatches of songsbrush us, pass us, give us delightful shocks.Then peradventure there’s a flash of lightning:whomever I…

Thou ever pourest for me the fresh draught of thy wine of variouscolours and fragrance, filling this earthen vessel to the brim.My world will light its hundred different lamps with thy flameand place them before the altar of thy temple.No, I will never shut the doors of my senses.The delights of sight and hearing and…

Let it not be a death but completeness.Let love melt into memory and paininto songs.Let the flight through the sky endin the folding of the wings over thenest.Let the last touch of your hands begentle like the flower of the night.Stand still, O Beautiful End, for amoment, and say your last words insilence.I bow to…

Leave all thy burdens on his hands who can bear all,and never look behind in regret.Thy desire at once puts out the light from the lamp it touches with its breath.It is unholy—take not thy gifts through its unclean hands.Accept only what is offered by sacred love.