Sri Aurobindo

Translations

CWSA.- Volume 5

Part Two. Translations from Bengali
Section One. Vaishnava Devotional Poetry

Selected Poems of Bidyapati

5

I saw not to the heart’s desire.

Beautiful friend, that sight was fire

Of lightning and like lightning went:

My heart with the bright bolt was rent.

Her dim white robe like hoar-frost thin

Half from the shoulder had fallen in.

Her beautiful mouth half-smiled and half

A glance from under her lids did laugh.

Half-naked shone her breasts’ sweet globes,

And half lay shadowy in her robes.

O then this bitter love and new!

Her body was of honey hue.

Her breasts, those cups of wondrous gold,

Love like a bodice did enfold;

The bodiless Love with subtle plan

To seize and hold the heart of man

With flowery cords his beauteous net

In the guise of a girl’s breasts had set.

Her teeth, a row of pearls, did meet

Her moving lips and sweet, O sweet

As liquid honey her delicate speech.

Within me burned a pain like fire!

Mine eyes dwelt with her, yet could not reach,

Gazing, the bottom of desire.