Scolding the thief of the heart, the Lord seated within
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
कोठें मी तुझा धरूं गेलें संग । लावियेलें जग माझ्या पाठीं ॥१॥
सर सर रे परता अवगुणाच्या गोवळा । नको लावूं चाळा खोटा येथें ॥ध्रु.॥
रूपाच्या लावण्यें नेली चित्तवृत्ती । न देखें भोंवतीं मी ते माझी ॥२॥
तुकयाचा स्वामी माझे जीवीं च बैसला । बोलीं च अबोला करूनियां ॥३॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
What came over me, keeping your company? You have set the whole world upon my trail. Go away, go back, you rascal of a cowherd. Do not play your false tricks here. The beauty of your form has stolen my mind and heart; I no longer see anything around me as my own. Says Tuka, my Lord has seated himself within my very life and, having done so, has fallen silent.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
What came over me, that I went near you? You have set the whole world on my trail. Go away, go back, you rascal of a cowherd. Do not play your false tricks here. The beauty of your form has carried off my mind and heart; I no longer see anything around me as my own. Tuka says: my Lord has seated himself in my very life, and having done so, has fallen silent.
What it means
A short scolding poem where the rebuke is the confession. She tells the cowherd to go away and stop his tricks, but in the same breath admits that his beauty has already taken her mind and that nothing around her feels like her own anymore. The angry words are the soul's protest against a captivation it cannot undo. Tukaram closes by dropping the quarrel entirely: the Lord has settled inside her very life and then gone silent, so the outward fuss is over a presence that has already moved in and will not leave.
Krishna Leela
Poems celebrating Krishna's birth, childhood, and divine play.
More in this theme →