Longing, holding God to His word
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
उपजल्या काळें शुभ कां शकुन । आतां आवरोन राहिलेती ॥1॥
नाहीं मागितली वचनाची जोडी । निष्काम कोरडी वरिवरि ॥ध्रु.॥
सत्याविण काय उगी च लांबणी । कारियाची वाणी येर भूस ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे ऐसी कोणा चाळवणी । न विचारा मनीं पांडुरंगा ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
At birth there were auspicious signs and omens; now You have drawn them back. I have not asked for the riches of sweet promises, only empty and superficial gestures. Without truth, what use is mere prolongation? Words without substance are just chaff. Says Tuka, O Panduranga, do You not think in Your mind of how long this evasion will last?.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
When I was born there were good omens and signs. Now you have drawn them all back. I did not ask for a pile of sweet promises. Empty words, dry on the surface, are nothing to me. Without truth, what is this dragging out for? Words with no substance are only chaff. Tuka says: O Panduranga, what trick is this? Do you not think about it in your own mind?
What it means
Tukaram speaks as one who was once given signs of God's favor and now feels them withdrawn. He refuses to be put off with kind-sounding promises that have no fulfillment behind them; he calls such words dry chaff. The thing he wants is truth, the real meeting, not a delay dressed up as comfort. So he presses Vitthal directly: this stalling is a kind of trick, and he asks God to look honestly at what He is doing. The poem names the ache of a devotee who will not let God substitute language for presence.
Longing and Separation
Cries from the dark night of the soul: remonstrances, complaints, and desperate yearning.
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