Once again I wake up when the night has waned,
when the world opens all its petals once more,
and this is an endless wonder.
Vast islands have sunk in the abyss unnamed,
stars have been beggared of the last flicker of their light,
countless epochs have lost all their ladings.
World conquerors have vanished into the shadow of a name
behind dim legends,
great nations raised their towers of triumph
as a mere offering to the unappeasable hunger of the dust.
Among this dissolving crowd of the discarded
my forehead receives the consecration of light,
and this is an endless wonder.
I stand for another day with the Himalayas,
with constellations of stars.
I am here where in the surging sea waves
the infuriate dance of the Terrible
is rhythmed with his boisterous laughter.
The centuries on which have flashed up and foundered
kingly crowns like bubbles
have left their signature on the bark of this aged tree,
where I am allowed to sit under its ancient shade for one more day,
and this is an endless wonder.
******************
On the bank of Rup-Natain
I awake:
This world
Is not a dream.
In words of blood I saw
My being.
I knew myself
Through hurts
And pain.
Truth is hard
And never deceives.
I loved that hardness.
Death-long tapasya of suffering
To win truth's terrible value
And to pay all debts
In death.
******************
The journey nears the road-end
where the shadows deepen with death.
The setting sun unties the last strings of its gifts,
Squanders gold with both hands.
Death is lighted with festive colors;
Life is before me.
With this word my breath will stop:
I loved.
Love's overbrimming mystery
joins death and life. It
Has filled my cup of pain
with joy.
The Vaisakh storm lashed sorrow's road
Where I walked, a lonely pilgrim,
Many nights bereft of light.
Yet beckonings reached my heart.
Slander's thorn pricked me
As a garland of triumph.
Gazing a the face of earth
I never exhausted wonder.
Lakshmi, grace in the lotus of beauty,
Touched me.
I caught in my flute
The breath that rocks with laughs and cries.
I claimed for my soul
Those human voices of the divine.
Many defeats, much fear and shame,
Yet I saw greatness.
In the midst of agony adn striving
The door suddenly opened.
...Today in the farewell of the year,
Death, remove your veil.
Much has fallen aside, love's tenderness often left me,
Lightless memory faded on the road
But at this deathless moment of life, O Death
Your hands are filled with treasure.