Sri Aurobindo

Translations

CWSA.- Volume 5

Part One. Translations from Sanskrit
Section Four. Bhartrihari. The Century of Life

On Karma

The Might of Works

Bow ye to Karma who with puissant hand

Like a vast potter all the universe planned,

Shut the Creator in and bade him work

In the dim-glinting womb and luminous murk;

By whom impelled high Vishnu hurled to earth

Travels his tenfold depths and whorls of birth;

Who leading mighty Rudra by the hand

Compels to wander strange from land to land,–

A vagrant begging with a skull for bowl

And suppliant palms, who is yet the world’s high Soul.

Lo, through the skies for ever this great Sun

Wheels circling round and round by Karma spun.