Autobiography, only the laborer
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
बोलविले जेणें । तो चि याचें गुहए जाणे ॥1॥
मी तों काबाडाचा धनी । जेवूं मागावें थिंकोनि ॥ध्रु.॥
मजुराच्या हातें । माप जालें गेलें रितें ॥2॥
जाला पुरविता । पांडुरंग माझा पिता॥3॥
मायबापासवें । बाळें कौतुकें खेळावें ॥4॥
जैसा करिती धंदा । तैसा पडोनियां छंदा ॥5॥
त्याच्या साच गाई ह्मैसी । येणें खेळावें मातीशीं ॥6॥
तुका ह्मणे बोल । माझा बोलतो विठ्ठल ॥7॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
The one who makes me speak is the only one who knows the secret of these words. I am merely the laborer; I must beg humbly for my meal. Through the hired hand's measure the grain comes and goes, filling and emptying. Panduranga, my father, has become the provider. Like a child playing happily with its parents, I play whatever game they set before me. His are the true cows and buffaloes; with these one may play in the mud. Says Tuka, it is Vitthal who speaks my words.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
The one who made me speak is the only one who knows the secret of these words. I am only the laborer; I must beg humbly for my meal. Through the hired hand the measure is filled and emptied again. Panduranga, my father, has become the provider. Like a child playing happily with its mother and father, I play whatever game they set for me. His are the true cows and buffaloes; with these one plays in the mud. Tuka says: it is Vitthal who speaks my words.
What it means
Tukaram disowns his own poems at the root: he is the day-laborer, not the master, and only the one who made him speak knows what the words really mean. The grain measure filling and emptying through a hired hand's work is his picture of inspiration passing through him without belonging to him. He casts himself as a child playing whatever game the parents set, and even names the cows and buffaloes as God's own, with the herdboy Krishna behind the image, so that the poet is simply a child playing in the mud of this life. The closing line states it plainly: the words are Vitthal's, not Tuka's, a confession of authorship that is really a confession of surrender.
Autobiography
Tukaram's own account of his life, struggles, awakening, and mission.
More in this theme →