Longing, who will show me Vitthal
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
कोणे गांवीं आहे सांगा हा विठ्ठल । जरी ठावा असेल तुह्मां कोणा ॥1॥
लागतसें पायां येतों लोटांगणीं । मात तरी कोणी सांगा याची ॥ध्रु.॥
गुण रूप याचे वाणिती या संतां । मज क्षेम देतां सुख वाटे ॥2॥
सर्वस्वें हा जीव ठेवीन चरणीं । पांडुरंग कोणी दावी तया ॥3॥
तुका ह्मणे गाईवत्सा तडातोडी । तैसी जाते घडी एकी मज ॥4॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
In what town does this Vitthal dwell? If any of you know, please tell me. I fall at your feet, I come rolling on the ground; will someone give me news of Him? The saints praise His virtues and His form; hearing of Him even from afar brings me joy. I will place my life, my all, at His feet. Will someone show me that Panduranga? Says Tuka, like a cow torn from her calf, every passing moment tears at me.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
In what town does this Vitthal live? If any of you knows, please tell me. I fall at your feet, I come rolling on the ground before you: will someone give me word of him? The saints praise his beauty and his ways, and even hearing of him from afar brings me joy. I will lay my whole life down at his feet; will someone show me that Panduranga? Tuka says: like a cow separated from her calf, each passing moment tears at me.
What it means
Tukaram plays the part of a desperate seeker going from person to person, begging for news of a beloved who seems to live in some unknown town. The posture is total: he falls at strangers' feet, rolls on the ground, ready to give his whole life just to be shown the way. Even secondhand praise of God from the saints is sweet to him, because it is all he has. The closing image, the cow torn from her calf, fixes the feeling: this is not calm seeking but the bodily anguish of separation, in which every moment apart is a wound.
Longing and Separation
Cries from the dark night of the soul: remonstrances, complaints, and desperate yearning.
More in this theme →