Rabindranath Tagore's Poetry

Category: Misc Poetry.

Wrote this in the afternoon. Posting it in the evening.

A Sunday afternoon - a perfect setting for poetry.
I'm reading Rabindranath Tagore's collections of poems.

To read Tagore is to experience the beauty of poetry in its pristine form.
If you enjoy reading poetry, and you haven't read Tagore—you should.

To read one line of Tagore is to forget all the worries of the world
But then, I'm a dreamer, and I get lost in my world! :-)
I need a Kavita (Poem) to give Disha (Direction) to my life.
(A play on words :-))

Tere pyaar mai kahin kavi na ban jau
Ae meri Kavita!
May I not become a poet in your love
Oh my Kavita (poem)!

The beauty of Tagore's poetry, makes you forget the world.
An example,
My heart the bird of the wilderness has found its sky in the beauty of your eyes
They are the cradle of the morning, they are the kingdom of the stars.
My songs are lost in their depths.
Let me but soar in that sky, in its lonely immensity.
Let me but cleave its clouds and spread wings in its sunshine.
~ From The Gardener

Amazing, isn't it. The power of words at the right places to construct a sentence that creates magic, and shows emotion in its different colours.

If you read it as prose, it is *just* a sentence.
If you *can* feel what is written; it is magic, absolute magic.

I've used the word can. One should have the ability to feel what is written, and that comes across through experiences that one has been through and personal interest.

Rabindranath Tagore's Poetry - Links to check, read, and download:
- Fruit-Gathering (html)
- Crescent Moon (txt)
- Gitanjali (txt) (pdf)
- The Gardener (txt)
- Fireflies (html)
- Google: Rabindranath Tagore, Rabindranath Tagore Quotes.

Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers but to be fearless in facing them.
Let me not beg for the stilling of my pain but for the heart to conquer it.
Let me not look for allies in life's battlefield but to my own strength.
Let me not crave in anxious fear to be saved but hope for the patience to win my freedom.
Grant me that I may not be a coward, feeling your mercy in my success alone;
but let me find the grasp of your hand in my failure.
~ Rabindranath Tagore - Fruit-Gathering

If you would have it so, I will end my singing.
If it sets your heart aflutter, I will take away my eyes from your face.
If it suddenly startles you in your walk, I will step aside and take another path.
If it confuses you in your flower-weaving, I will shun your lonely garden.
If it makes the water wanton and wild, I will not row my boat by your bank.
~ Rabindranath Tagore - The Gardener

On the seashore of endless worlds children meet.

The infinite sky is motionless overhead and the restless water is
boisterous. On the seashore of endless worlds the children meet
with shouts and dances.

They build their houses with sand, and they play with empty
shells. With withered leaves they weave their boats and
smilingly float them on the vast deep. Children have their play
on the seashore of worlds.

They know not how to swim, they know not how to cast nets.
Pearl-fishers dive for pearls, merchants sail in their ships,
while children gather pebbles and scatter them again. They seek
not for hidden treasures, they know not how to cast nets.

The sea surges up with laughter, and pale gleams the smile of the
sea-beach. Death-dealing waves sing meaningless ballads to the
children, even like a mother while rocking her baby's cradle.
The sea plays with children, and pale gleams the smile of the
sea-beach.

On the seashore of endless worlds children meet. Tempest roams
in the pathless sky, ships are wrecked in the trackless water,
death is abroad and children play. On the seashore of endless
worlds is the great meeting of children.
~ Rabindranath Tagore - Crescent Moon

Where the mind is without fear

This is one of my favourite poems. (I prefer the English spelling of favourite).

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow
domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the
dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought
and action-
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
~ Rabindranath Tagore - Gitanjali

Read and download Tagore's poetry at the Gutenberg web site.

This is a cool post. I'm going to bookmark it for my ready reference.

Let me write a two-liner.

To have nothing and be comfortable is worse
than having everything and being unhappy
Always choose the lesser evil
Make money and be unhappy!

A Haiku (5-7-5). Can you call this as one?

Empty azure skies in November
An eagle soars above the lazy clouds
Inviting them for a race

Cheers
Chirayu