Adoration of the form, the demanding child
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
आवडे हें रूप गोजिरें सगुण । पाहातां लोचन सुखावलें ॥1॥
आतां दृष्टीपुढें ऐसा चि तूं राहीं । जों मी तुज पाहें पांडुरंगा ॥ध्रु.॥
लाचावलें मन लागलीसे गोडी । तें जीवें न सोडीं ऐसें जालें ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे आह्मी केली जे लडिवाळी । पुरवावी आळी मायबापें ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
I love this beautiful and gracious form. Beholding it, my eyes are filled with delight. Now remain before my sight just as You are, so that I may gaze upon You, O Panduranga. My mind has tasted the sweetness and grown eager; it has become inseparable from this love. Says Tuka, we have been playful children; now, as our parents, fulfill our every whim.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
I love this lovely form with all its qualities. When I look at it, my eyes are filled with joy. Now stay just like this before my sight, so that I may keep gazing at You, Panduranga. My mind has tasted the sweetness and grown greedy for it; it has become something I cannot give up while I live. Tuka says: we have been your spoiled children; now, as our mother and father, grant us every whim.
What it means
Tukaram delights in the visible, qualified form of Vitthal and asks the Lord simply to hold still so he can keep gazing. He admits the look has made his mind greedy: it has tasted sweetness and now cannot let go of it for as long as he lives. Rather than apologize for this hunger, he leans into it, casting himself and his fellow devotees as small children and God as the parent. The plea is the plea of a child: indulge our every whim. The boldness is allowed precisely because the bond is a family one, love claiming its rights.
Devotion to Vitthal
Poems of praise, invocation, and intimate address to Lord Vitthal at Pandharpur.
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