Ode To Rabindranath Tagore

Forlorn hands in the dawn of December, 

had fell apart as the ashes of slaked ember. 

She lay on the bed as cold as doom, 

and stared out of her window room. 

The sun was setting in the river horizon, 

while she pitied her fate which brimmed of poison. 

Seldom,

She fathomed of her living companion, 

While he camped himself across Dhaleshwari - the river. 

He gazed at the perfection of her eyes, in the reflection 

of the river and his heart's perception. 

He remembers the youth days of her life. 

In her red golden daccai sari, 

she lost the sight of the world, and the world lost the sight of her.

"Jamai babu didn't turn up!" the old man said, 

So she threw herself in the river bed. 

They searched and searched for her body for weeks and days, 

hours spend in anxious ways. 

Alas! When they gave up and couldn't find, 

the soulless body of the cursed bride, 

they deemed the tragedy just a phase, 

and their lives moved on at a steady pace. 

However the forgotten bride, 

Had miraculously survived. 

Washed down to a river shore, 

which was devoid of any dwelling door. 

It was then, that for the very first time, 

She had opened her eyes under his caressing shadow. 

Her body all soggy, wrinkled , wet. 

But this was not at all her fret. 

Why had she survived? what purpose was she to serve? 

The pain, the misery, betrayal of love... Was it not quite enough ? 

The wind made his hair ripple, 

while she sat and weeped for her dreams crippled. 

She screeched 

and weeped 

and veiled her face with her hands 

and wailed. 

She sat hidden from the sunlight pale, 

and told the tale of the love that failed. 

While all he did, was standing there 

Calmly and Patiently. 

This was a destiny bond, 

and led to a passion born 

within the lady.

She was in love with him. 

He was just a bud then.

As weeks and months passed by, 

she talked to him about a new hope, 

a new home that she had build right across the river shore. 

She told him of her dreams with her dear beloved,

She then cried quietly, nobody spoke. 

She wondered 

and fantasized, 

He wouldn't judge 

nor would he mind.

The springs and winters passed by.

He grew to a flower and she to a woman.

The time flowed like the liquid river,

but she never tried to deliver 

herself from lovelorn of her marriage.

Once upon a dreary time,

He bore a fruit like peach and lime,

She bit through the juicy fruit out of hunger,

Little she knew of the blunder.

He wanted to relieve her from the grotesque sadness.

The madness,

of speaking to an inanimate tree.

The fruit was poisoned,

so was she.

Her last breath in the world was of sorrow,

She wished she could see him tomorrow.

Her reality lay with her in the bed – a widow,

Gazing out of her window.

She thinks of her beloved

Wonders if he ever loved

Her as much as she did.

She took the breath in,

with the air came all the possibilities that could have been,

if and only if He hadn’t run away from her.

All ruins of memories revive,

She wondered if he were alive.
She shed the last tear for him as it ran down her cheek,

The breath escaped with rush of air with the words she could never speak.  

Based on the poem Flute Music By Gurudev Robindronath Thakur (Rabindranath Tagore)