Her friend said:
Lord of the land
where swollen torrents
thunder through mountain caves
after the heavy rains,
desire is easily sated,
but will her affection for you
fade quite as easily?
(42)
She said:
To think he would never leave,
(43)
Her mother scours the countryside looking for her daughter and her lover. She said:
My legs won't carry me any further -
(44)
Her friend said:
He gets up early,
(45)
The heroine reassures her friend who is concerned for her after her lover's departure. She said:
Wherever he may have gone
(46)
Her friend addresses the moon:
Bright silvery moon!
(47)
Her friend said:
Look how she suffers -
(48)
She said:
O my love,
(49)
Her husband has been unfaithful and sends a messenger to plead on his behalf. ‘The places where he bathes with his girlfriends have been made beautiful with scattered blossoms, but look at me!’ she retorts. She said:
Covered over with tiny cassia flowers
(50)
Her friend said:
I like him
(51)
The heroine is afraid that her lovelorn state will be interpreted as some form of demonic possession and that her lover may reject her. Her friend has noticed this, and tells her that she has been doing her best to expedite matters and that a proposal is imminent.
Her friend said:
Even though you found favour
(52)
Her friend speaks to her lover, warning him of the danger of neglecting his vow to his beloved:
My Lord, there in our yard
(53)
She said:
He has gone - and I am alone -
(54)
Her friend speaks, knowing that her lover is listening in secret. She said:
Carrying despair before it
(55)
The lover speaks: realizing the hardships of the barren, inhospitable country through which he is passing, the lover reflects upon his painful decision to leave his beloved behind, and speaks to his heart:
To think of her here with me
(56)
The heroine speaks: closely guarded by her family and unable to meet her lover, the heroine confides in her friend, saying that it would be preferable to have no life at all than to live separated from the one she loves:
Rather than bear the pain of living alone
(57)
The lover replies to his friend who is admonishing him over his lovesick behaviour:
My friend
(58)
Her friend said:
How could he forget your fair brow,
that was my mistake
and to think I would never consent
to his leaving,
that was his.
Meanwhile
my heart reels
as if from a cobra's bite
with the pain caused
by two people's wilfulness.
I have looked and stared so long
that my eyes can't see anything anymore.
Surely they are more numerous
than all the stars
in heaven's vast firmament,
the people in this world who are not them!
her Lord of the fertile plains,
and makes ready his chariot
which carries him all too swiftly
into the arms of girls
whose finery at least
is beyond reproach.
And when he returns,
flushed and happy,
how her mind whirls,
this mother with her young child.
Pain is the price she pays
it seems
for such noble breeding.
he won't be able
to escape the pain of lonely eventide
when the small birds
who live around the houses -
their folded wings looking like
faded water lilies -
peck at the paddy heaped in the yard,
and take dusty baths in the dried cow dung
in the village meeting place,
before returning to the young chicks
in their nests under the eaves.
To a lover who comes by night
through the forest
where a tumbled boulder
striped with the fallen blossoms
of a sturdy venkai tree
can suddenly look like the cub
of a powerful mountain tiger,
you do no favour at all.
she left her straw doll in the cool shade
and now her playmates are calling to her, saying,
'Your baby's sweltering in the hot sun
go and save her!'
But she hardly hears them, them way she is now.
Yet to relieve the pallor of her fair brow
couldn't her lover
whose words inspire such a deep longing
spare her just one more?
from shores lapped by waters,
dark like sapphire,
where the thorn bushes
are laden with pollen,
with spines as sharp as squirrels' teeth,
when this lifetime is over
and we live again in another incarnation,
may you still be my husband
and I
she whose heart is as one with yours.
that look like white pepper
and the marutam trees' faded red blossoms,
the bathing places in his village
look really pretty.
As for me, these bright bangles
have slipped down
and hang loose at my wrists
and the shoulders he once embraced
have grown thin
adorned only by the pain of abandonment.
and so does your mother,
your lover
from the white sandy shores
where dark blossoms fly on the wind
in the dewy cold
like beads when a necklace bursts
from amidst the mundaka's curving thorns
to be scattered here, there and everywhere.
Your father is keen on the match -
even the gossips have you married to him.
with the demon Goddess of the mountains
which send glittering torrents
crashing down into the sea below,
yet still you trembled with foreboding.
I saw it, my girl,
you with your heavy scented braids
and you bright white even teeth -
and didn't I soften their hearts,
little by little?
on that broad expanse of white sand
washed up on the river banks,
where the punku trees scatter their bursting buds
so that it looks like the hallowed ground
prepared by the priest
with a sprinkling of silvery rice grains
for the ritual dance of the Velan,
you took my lady's slender wrist
and swore an oath the goddess Cur,
an oath which has caused up much pain indeed.
my Lord of the hill country
where a wild elephant,
startled by the whistling of stones
from the slings of watchmen
in the millet fields,
releases a green bamboo stem
so that it springs back
like a fisherman's rod landing a catch.
And with him has gone
all that I am worth as a woman.
The blustery north wind comes,
swathed in clouds of black,
scattering a cold drizzle
and whipping a fine spray
from the crests of the foaming waves
so that the lilies on the broad salt marshes
draw in their sapphire blue petals.
This pretty little town
has become a painful abode indeed.
where at best she may survive a day or two.
her arms adorned with bright bangles
drinking water from this small dirty pool
scooped out by the claws of thirsty wild dogs
and covered with dead leaves of wild jasmine!
What a pitiable sight she would make,
she who dwells in my heart,
what a pitiable sight.
in a world where we are intended to share our
life with another
I would rather that my life desert me here and now
along with that love which can never die
and which makes our separation so unbearable.
We are like a pair of love-birds who suffer
as though they have been parted for an age
if so much as a water-lily comes between them
as they swim along.
your advice is welcome
if it can ease my inner turmoil -
otherwise it is useless.
The pain spreads all through me
like butter
which has been left on a hot rock
under the burning sun
in the charge of a dumb man with no arms -
and I am powerless to stop it.
fragrant with jasmine flowers
intertwined with blue water lilies
from the broad deep tanks of Mount Aralai
where the King dispenses his bounty
to the rhythmic beat of one-eyed drums?
In any case, try as he may
he won't come across too many rare treasures
out there in the desert.
He won't be too long away.