Exhortation, nothing goes with you
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
धन मेळवूनि कोटी । सवें नये रे लंगोटी ॥1॥
पानें खाशील उदंड । अंतीं जासी सुकल्या तोंडें ॥ध्रु.॥
पलंग न्याहाल्या सुपती । शेवटीं गोवया सांगाती ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे राम । एक विसरतां श्रम ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
You may amass millions in wealth, but not even a loincloth will accompany you in the end. You may chew betel lavishly, but you will depart with a dry mouth. You may sleep on luxurious beds, but in the end, a coarse shroud will be your companion. Says Tuka, forgetting Rama alone brings all suffering.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
You may gather wealth by the crore, but not even a loincloth goes with you. You may chew betel without limit, but in the end you leave with a dry mouth. You may sleep on luxurious beds, but at the last a coarse shroud is your companion. Tuka says: forgetting Rama alone is the whole of suffering.
What it means
Tukaram strips away the things people spend a life chasing by following each to its end. Crores of wealth cannot send even a scrap of cloth along at death; the endless betel leaves only a parched mouth; the soft bed is traded for the rough cloth of the corpse. The pattern shows that comfort and possession reach exactly to the edge of death and no further. Against that emptiness he sets the one thing that matters: the real loss, the source of all suffering, is forgetting Rama. Remember the Name, and the things that abandon you at the grave lose their power to deceive you now.
Appeals and Exhortations
Direct calls to action: wake up, seek God, do not waste this human birth.
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