Longing, the mother who consoles
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
नाहीं दिलें कधीं कठिण उत्तर । तरी कां अंतर पडियेलें ॥1॥
ह्मणऊनि आतां वियोग न साहे । लांचावलें देहे संघष्टणें ॥ध्रु.॥
वेळोवेळां वाचे आठवितों नाम । अधिक चि प्रेम चढे घेतां ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे पांडुरंगे जननिये । घेऊनि कडिये बुझाविलें ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
I have never spoken a harsh word to you, so why has this distance fallen between us? This separation is unbearable, for my body has grown addicted to your embrace. Again and again my tongue calls upon your name, and the more I chant, the more my love increases. Says Tuka, O Panduranga, like a mother you have taken me onto your lap and consoled me.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
I have never given you a harsh word, so why has this distance come between us? Because of it I cannot bear the separation now; my body is starved for your touch. Again and again my tongue remembers your name, and the more I take it, the more my love rises. Tuka says: Panduranga, like a mother, took me up onto her lap and comforted me.
What it means
Tukaram pleads against a separation he feels he has not earned, since he has never once spoken harshly to God. The distance is unbearable because his body has grown used to the nearness, hungry for the touch of God like a starved thing. His only recourse is the Name, repeated again and again, and he notices that each repetition does not dull the longing but raises the love higher. The poem ends with the answer to the plea: Panduranga responds not as a distant lord but as a mother, lifting him onto her lap and consoling him, and the divine is named in tender, maternal terms.
Longing and Separation
Cries from the dark night of the soul: remonstrances, complaints, and desperate yearning.
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