ANONYMOUS. XCVIII. UMĀ EXPLAINS HER INABILITY TO COME

XCVIII. UMĀ EXPLAINS HER INABILITY TO COME

You forget me, Mother, and all that I endured with my mad husband. Bhōlā is ever laughing and weeping and knows no one save me. He is always eating hemp, and I must stay near him. I cannot keep from worrying and wondering if he is safe or if any harm has come to him.

I have to lift his food up to his mouth, or he would forget to eat. There is nothing left of me, I am spent with worrying about this madman. I put him at his ease and came away, and then what floods of tears I shed, Mother. For I was fearful lest he go off alone, and none is so careless of himself as he.

 

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DĀŚARATHĪ RĀY

XCIX. THE NEIGHBOURS COME TO CONGRATULATE MENAKĀ;

Arise, arise, Mother, bind up thy hair. Here comes the daughter of the stone, here comes thy Īśānī.

Lovely as the moon thy daughter comes; she carries her two children in her arms; and, as she comes, she calls aloud, 'Where is my mother?' O Queen, the three worlds bless thy daughter, and in the three worlds there is none that can compare with her.

We thought she was Śiva's well-beloved; today we hear that she's thy daughter. Is it she, my Mother, who drives away the fear of the world? What mother has there been in all the earth as fortunate as thou, who didst conceive so fair a jewel in thy womb?

Mother, that star of thine is wife to Chandrachūḍa;[285] the brightness of the moon pales before her moon-like loveliness.

Such beauty I have never seen in any other; your Haramanomōhinī[286] takes away the darkness of my mind.

FOOTNOTES:

[285] The moon-crested one. See note to XXVI.

[286] She who has enchanted Hara (Śiva).

 

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RĀMPRASĀD SEN

C. MENAKĀ WILL NOT SEND HER DAUGHTER BACK AGAIN

Giri, when my Umā comes to me, I will not send her back again. I will net heed the words of anyone, though men may say that what I do is wrong. If Mṛituñjaya appears and says that he would take my Umā, then mother and daughter will be quarrelling, careless of his being son-in-law to me.

Rāmprasād[287] the twice-born says: How shall I endure such grief? Śiva haunts the burning-ground and execution places, and has no thought for home.

FOOTNOTES:

[287] The poet, like a Greek Chorus, associates himself with the speaker in this drama.

CI. ŚIVA CLAIMS HIS BRIDE AGAIN

Giribara, Lord of my life, my body is quaking with fear. What dreadful story is this I have heard, that has turned my day into night? Mahākāla has spread by the door his tiger skin, and there he sits and calls, and calls again: 'Come out, O mother of Gaṇeśa.'

Hard as stone is thy body,[288] hard as stone is my soul; therefore all these days we have endured.[289]

Our daughter is another's wealth; we know this, yet we would not understand. Alas! Alas! is this how Vidhātā[290] doth mock at us?

Prasād's word is this: As, when the daylight comes, the chakōrī;[291] despairs because his store of honey has disappeared, so, Himagiri's Queen, art thou made desolate.

A Vijayā; song. Menakā is speaking to her husband.

FOOTNOTES:

[288] He is Himālaya, remember.

[289] Literally, have not burst.

[290] The Creator.

[291] The bird that feeds only on the nectar dropping from the moon.

 

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RAJANIKĀNTA SEN

CII. THE MOTHER'S GRIEF TO LET HER DAUGHTER GO

Night, do thou stay; let not the dawn appear. Strike no more the wounded heart. Think once of what I suffer, listen once to what I say. Look in mercy upon me, so terribly stricken with grief.

O Time, rest that weary body of thine. Rest for a little while, 'tis not for long; rest for this night. Full well I know, thy wheel is ever turning; yet for today, my Lord, may it move slowly. O shining starry hosts, dim not this night your brightness. As the lamp's flame, shielded from the breeze, flickers not, so do you stay motionless.[292] When in the western sky you set, then comes the dawn; and when your light is dimmed, a thunderbolt will fall upon my head.

Thou rising sun of Daśamī, thou symbol of eternal cruelty, wilt thou now arise? Fate's executioner[293] art thou.

Kānta says: Rājmahishī,[294] that one whom saints and sages never knew, she has been three days within thy breast. Why, then, these tears?

Almost a Vijayā; song. Umā's Mother is speaking, on the night of the ninth day after the new (pūjā;) moon. Her prayer is Ovid's Lente, lente currite, noctis equi. The next day (Daśamī;, the tenth day), Umā leaves her.

FOOTNOTES:

[292] Literally, be like the pole-star.

[293] Carrying out Fate's decrees.

[294] King's wife.

CIII. THE GRIEF WHEN UMĀ HAS GONE

Umā has left her unhappy mother. My sorrow cannot be measured with my tears. Alas! that none should understand my woe!

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Prostrate, I held her feet. How I wept! yet she would not take me with her. How can I go back again to a home bereft of Umā?

I know full well my heart cannot endure such suffering. I shall die of grief for Umā, or else become as one beside herself.

Since midnight on Navamī[295] Umā has been plunged in lamentation; today she put her arms about my neck and, weeping, took her leave of me.

With tear-stained, saddened face she says: 'Terribly stricken at heart am I, my Mother, to see your grief. My tears come flooding forth.

'Have you caught me in delusion's snare?[296] I cannot forget you. Yet there is no escape for me, so I must go. Think you my soul desires to go?

'Weep no more, Mother. I will come again. Then take this hope and tame your restless heart.' And, as she spoke, Umā wiped my eyes with the corner of her śāṛī;.[297]

Even now before my eyes there floats the vision of that lovely face, radiant with tenderness, and faultless as the full moon.

These eyes of flesh will look on her again, yet such a thought is not enough to satisfy my heart. It is my Umā that I want. I want to see her, hear her, touch her. Kānta, perplexed, wonders to himself: How will the year pass by? If you trust in Umā, Queen, shall you see autumn once again?

A Vijayā; song.

FOOTNOTES:

[295] The ninth day.

[296] Umā, a goddess, is above the sphere of māyā;. But her heart is so wrung at departure, that she wonders if she is being drawn into its net of illusive joys and sorrows.

[297] A Bengali lady's dress.

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