‘Is There Some Way I Can Reach You?’

Longing

Is there some way I can reach you?
You have no end and no beginning.

I want to praise your good qualities,
but you have no qualities.
I try to think of you in my mind.
You sit behind every thought.

Is there some way I can reach you?

I want to worship you with my hands,
but you are huge, you fill all space.
I would bring you a gift, but you have everything
in the world.

Is there some way I can reach you?

I want to see you with my eyes.
You have no visible form.
God on the hill, you’re in all these things.
All I can say is, I am yours.

Is there some way I can reach you?

(Annamacharya: V Narayana Rao and David Shulman)

Whatever It was

that made this earth
the base,
the world its life,
the wind its pillar,
arranged the lotus and the moon,
and covered it all with folds
of sky

with Itself inside,

to that Mystery
indifferent to differences,

to It I pray,
O Ramanatha.

(Devara Dasimayya: A. K. Ramanujan)

It is the month of Chet,
It is spring. All is seemly —
The humming bumble-bee
And the woodland in flower —
But there is a sorrow in my soul.

The Lord, my Master, is away.
If the Husband comes not home, how can a wife
Find peace of mind?
Sorrows of separation waste away the body.
The koel calls in the mango grove,
Its notes are full ofjoy.
Why then the sorrow in my soul?
The bumble-bee hovers about the blossoming bough,
O mother of mine, it is like death to me,
For there is a sorrow in my soul.

Nanak says: When the Lord her Master comes home to her,
Blessed then is the month of Chet.

(Guru Nanak: Khushwant Singh)

She lingers out of doors.
She rushes in
And she rushes out,
Her heart is restless.
Breathing fast,
She gazes at the kadamba wood.
What has happened
That she is not afraid?
The elders chatter
And the wicked gossip.

Is she possessed
By some enchanting god?
Forever restless
Careless of clothes,
Startled, she jumps in her dreams...

Her desire inflamed
By passion and longing,
She reaches for the moon.

Chandidas says that she is caught
In the snare of Kaliya, the dark.

(Chandidas: Deben Bhattacharya)

I don’t call you “father” or “mother,”
“O Lord, “ is good enough for me.
Yet Lord, you won’t consider me one of your creatures,
won’t show me even a little of your grace.
Alas, if he waits too long to bless his devotees,
do I have no Master
other than the Lord who lives
in Paccilacciramam where wild geese swim in the lakes?

(Sundarar: Indira Viswanathan Peterson)

We’re told you’re the holiest of holies.
How is it your bhaktas still suffer?
Your bhaktas, you say, are part of your body.
Now who’s to blame? The body or its parts?
Shame on the lion, if the bear steals his cub.
Kanhopatra offers up her body, says: Now keep your word.

(Kanhopatra: Jerry Pinto and Neela Bhagwat)

All around us, clouds burst.
Yet with every drop, sister,
this parched body aches
and craves for Krishna.

(Rahim: Mustansir Dalvi)

Don’t make me hear all day
Whose man, whose man, whose man is this?’

Let me hear, ‘This man is mine, mine
this man is mine.’

O lord of the meeting rivers,
make me feel I’m a son
of the house.

(Basavanna: A. K. Ramanujan)

The spotless being depicted holding a silver
conch in his left hand will not show his form

to me. He arrives through an underground
spring to liquefy my house’s foundations,

to seep into the walls and overflow my heart:
pure torture. Warbling kohl-bird drunk on

honey from the twitching stamen of magnolia
blossoms, intercede to the lord of Venkata

on my behalf, murmur, get him to come.

(Andal: Ravi Shankar)