Longing, you live where your heart is
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
ज्याची जया आस । तयाजवळी त्या वास ॥1॥
येर जवळी तें दुरी । धेनु वत्स सांडी घरीं ॥ध्रु.॥
गोडी िप्रयापाशीं । सुख उपजे येरासी ॥2॥
तुका म्हणे बोल । घडे तयाठायीं मोल॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Where one's longing lies, there one dwells. All else, even if near, is truly distant, like a cow that leaves home to find her calf. Sweetness lies with the beloved, and joy arises in the other through that connection. Says Tuka, a word has value only where it finds its true place.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Where your longing lies, there you live. Everything else, even what is near, is truly far. A cow leaves the house to go find her calf. Sweetness is with the beloved. Through that bond, joy rises in the other one too. Tuka says: a word has worth only where it finds its true place.
What it means
Tukaram is naming a law of the heart: you are not where your body stands, you are where your longing rests. Whatever you ache for is close, and whatever you do not, though it sit beside you, is distant; the cow walks away from the house because her love is in the calf, not the walls. He turns this on God: sweetness lives with the beloved, and the love that flows toward the beloved kindles answering joy in the beloved too. The closing line presses the point: speech, like longing, counts for nothing unless it lands where it truly belongs.
Longing and Separation
Cries from the dark night of the soul: remonstrances, complaints, and desperate yearning.
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