Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941)

Brahmā, Vişņu, Śiva 

I  THE DARK

In a worldless timeless lightless great emptiness

Four-faced Brahma broods.

nasad asin, no sad asit tadanim;

nasid raja no vioma paro yat.

kim avarivah? kuha? kasya sarmann?

Ambhah kim asid, gahanam gabhiram?

na mytur asid, amrtam na tarhi.

na ratria ahna asit pratekh.

anid avatam svadhaya tad ekam.

tasmad dhanyan na parah kim canasa.

tama asit tamasa gudham agre;

apraketam salilam sarvam a idam.

tuchyenabhu apihitam yad asit,

tapasas tan mahinajayataikam.

Of a sudden sea of joy surges through his heart –

The ur-god opens his eyes.

Speech from four mouths

Speeds from each quarter.

Through infinite dark,

Through limitless sky,

Like a growing sea-storm,

Like hope never sated,

His Word starts to move.

Stirred by joy his breathing quickens,

His eight eyes quiver with flame.

His fire-matted hair sweeps the horizon,

Bright as a million suns.

From the towering source of the world

In a thousand streams

Cascades the primeval blazing fountain,

Fragmenting silence,

Splitting its stone heart.

kamas tad agre sam avartatadhi

manaso retah prathamam yad asit?

sato bandhum asati nir avindan

hrdi pratisya kavayo manisa

II  THE MUSIC

In a universe rampant

With new life exhalant,

With new life exultant,

Vishnu spreads wide

His four-handed blessing.

He raises his conch

And all things quake

At its booming sound.

The frenzy dies down,

The furnace expires,

The planets douse

Their flames with tears,

The world’s Divine Poet

Constructs its history,

From wild cosmic song

Its epic is formed.

Stars in their orbits,

Moon sun and planets –

He binds with his mace

All things to Law,

Imposes the discipline

Of metre and rhyme.

In the Manasa depths

Vishnu watches -

Beauties arise

From the light of lotuses.

Lakshmi strews smiles -

Clouds show a rainbow,

Gardens show flowers.

The roar of Creation

Resolves into music.

Softness hides rigour,

Forms cover power.

tirascino vitato rasmir esam:

adhah svid asid, upari svid asit?

retodha asan, mahimana asan;

svadha avasat, prayatih parastat.

Age after age after age is slave to a mighty rhythm –

At last the world-frame

Tires in its body,

Sleep in its eyes

Slackens its structure,

Diffuses its energy.

From the heart of all matter

Comes the anguished cry –

‘Wake, wake, great Shiva,

Our body grows weary

Of its law-fixed path,

Give us new form.

Sing our destruction,

That we gain new life.’

III THE FIRE

The great god awakes,

His three eyes open,

He surveys all horizons.

He lifts his bow, his fell pinaka,

He pounds the world with his tread.

From first things to last it trembles and shakes

And shudders.

The bonds of nature are ripped.

The sky is rocked by the roar

Of a wave of ecstatic release.

An inferno soars –

The pyre of the universe.

Shattered sun and moon, smashed stars and planets,

Rain down from all angles,

A blackness of all particles

To be swallowed by flame,

Absorbed in an instant.

At the start of Creation

There was a dark without origin,

At the breaking of Creation

There is fire without end

In an all-pervading sky-engulfing sea of burning

Shiva shuts his three eyes.

He begins his great trance.

ko adha veda? Ka iha pravocat,

kuta ajata, kuta iyam visrstih?

arvag deva asya visajanena:

atha ko veda yata ababhuva?

iyam visrstir yata ababhuva;

yadi vasa dadhe yadi van na:

yo asyadhyaksah parame vioman

so anga veda, yadi va na veda.

 Images: E. Espada