Sarojini Naidu
Indian Weavers
WEAVERS, weaving at break of day, Why do you weave a garment so gay? . . . Blue as the wing of a halcyon wild, We weave the robes of a new-born child. Weavers,
To My Children
Jaya Surya GOLDEN sun of victory, born In my life’s unclouded morn, In my lambent sky of love, May your growing glory prove Sacred to your consecration, To my heart and to my nation.
Harvest Hymn
Mens Voices: LORD of the lotus, lord of the harvest, Bright and munificent lord of the morn! Thine is the bounty that prospered our sowing, Thine is the bounty that nurtured our corn. We
Damayante To Nala In The Hour Of Exile
SHALT thou be conquered of a human fate My liege, my lover, whose imperial head Hath never bent in sorrow of defeat? Shalt thou be vanquished, whose imperial feet Have shattered armies and stamped
The Poet To Death
TARRY a while, O Death, I cannot die While yet my sweet life burgeons with its spring; Fair is my youth, and rich the echoing boughs Where dhadikulas sing. Tarry a while, O Death,
The Song Of Princess Zeb-Un-Nissa In Praise Of Her Own Beauty
WHEN from my cheek I lift my veil, The roses turn with envy pale, And from their pierced hearts, rich with pain, Send forth their fragrance like a wail. Or if perchance one perfumed
Transcience
Nay, do not grieve tho’ life be full of sadness, Dawn will not veil her spleandor for your grief, Nor spring deny their bright, appointed beauty To lotus blossom and ashoka leaf. Nay, do
Suttee
LAMP of my life, the lips of Death Hath blown thee out with their sudden breath; Naught shall revive thy vanished spark. . . Love, must I dwell in the living dark? Tree of
In The Forest
HERE, O my heart, let us burn the dear dreams that are dead, Here in this wood let us fashion a funeral pyre Of fallen white petals and leaves that are mellow and red,
Village Song
HONEY, child, honey, child, whither are you going? Would you cast your jewels all to the breezes blowing? Would you leave the mother who on golden grain has fed you? Would you grieve the
Indian Love Song
She LIKE a serpent to the calling voice of flutes, Glides my heart into thy fingers, O my Love! Where the night-wind, like a lover, leans above His jasmine-gardens and sirisha-bowers; And on ripe
A Rajput Love Song
(Parvati at her lattice) O Love! were you a basil-wreath to twine Among my tresses, A jewelled clasp of shining gold to bind around my sleeve, O Love! were you the keora’s soul that
Cradle Song
FROM groves of spice, O’er fields of rice, Athwart the lotus-stream, I bring for you, Aglint with dew A little lovely dream. Sweet, shut your eyes, The wild fire-fiies Dance through the fairy neem;
Indian Dancer
EYES ravished with rapture, celestially panting, what passionate bosoms aflaming with fire Drink deep of the hush of the hyacinth heavens that glimmer around them in fountains of light; O wild and entrancing the
Palanquin Bearers
Lightly, O lightly we bear her along, She sways like a flower in the wind of our song; She skims like a bird on the foam of a stream, She floats like a laugh
Song Of A Dream
ONCE in the dream of a night I stood Lone in the light of a magical wood, Soul-deep in visions that poppy-like sprang; And spirits of Truth were the birds that sang, And spirits
Nightfall In The City Of Hyderabad
SEE how the speckled sky burns like a pigeon’s throat, Jewelled with embers of opal and peridote. See the white river that flashes and scintillates, Curved like a tusk from the mouth of the
LEILI
THE serpents are asleep among the poppies, The fireflies light the soundless panther’s way To tangled paths where shy gazelles are straying, And parrot-plumes outshine the dying day. O soft! the lotus-buds upon the
Ode to H. H. The Nizam Of Hyderabad
DEIGN, Prince, my tribute to receive, This lyric offering to your name, Who round your jewelled scepter bind The lilies of a poet’s fame; Beneath whose sway concordant dwell The peoples whom your laws
To The God of Pain
UNWILLING priestess in thy cruel fane, Long hast thou held me, pitiless god of Pain, Bound to thy worship by reluctant vows, My tired breast girt with suffering, and my brows Anointed with perpetual
The Pardah Nashin
HER life is a revolving dream Of languid and sequestered ease; Her girdles and her fillets gleam Like changing fires on sunset seas; Her raiment is like morning mist, Shot opal, gold and amethyst.
My Dead Dream
HAVE YOU found me, at last, O my Dream? Seven eons ago You died and I buried you deep under forests of snow. Why have you come hither? Who bade you awake from your
The Poet's Love-Song
In noon-tide hours, O Love, secure and strong, I need thee not; mad dreams are mine to bind The world to my desire, and hold the wind A voiceless captive to my conquering song.
In Praise Of Henna
A KOKILA called from a henna-spray: Lira! liree! Lira! liree! Hasten, maidens, hasten away To gather the leaves of the henna-tree. Send your pitchers afloat on the tide, Gather the leaves ere the dawn
Life
CHILDREN, ye have not lived, to you it seems Life is a lovely stalactite of dreams, Or carnival of careless joys that leap About your hearts like billows on the deep In flames of
Ecstasy
Cover mine eyes, O my Love! Mine eyes that are weary of bliss As of light that is poignant and strong O silence my lips with a kiss, My lips that are weary of
Wandering Singers
WHERE the voice of the wind calls our wandering feet, Through echoing forest and echoing street, With lutes in our hands ever-singing we roam, All men are our kindred, the world is our home.
A Love Song from the North
Tell me no more of thy love, papeeha, Wouldst thou recall to my heart, papeeha, Dreams of delight that are gone, When swift to my side came the feet of my lover With stars
To A Buddha Seated On A Lotus
LORD BUDDHA, on thy Lotus-throne, With praying eyes and hands elate, What mystic rapture dost thou own, Immutable and ultimate? What peace, unravished of our ken, Annihilate from the world of men? The wind
An Indian Love Song
He Lift up the veils that darken the delicate moon Of thy glory and grace, Withhold not, O love, from the night Of my longing the joy of thy luminous face, Give me a
Past and Future
The new hath come and now the old retires: And so the past becomes a mountain-cell, Where lone, apart, old hermit-memories dwell In consecrated calm, forgotten yet Of the keen heart that hastens to
Alabaster
LIKE this alabaster box whose art Is frail as a cassia-flower, is my heart, Carven with delicate dreams and wrought With many a subtle and exquisite thought. Therein I treasure the spice and scent
To My Fairy Fancies
NAY, no longer I may hold you, In my spirit’s soft caresses, Nor like lotus-leaves enfold you In the tangles of my tresses. Fairy fancies, fly away To the white cloud-wildernesses, Fly away! Nay,
To India
O YOUNG through all thy immemorial years! Rise, Mother, rise, regenerate from thy gloom, And, like a bride high-mated with the spheres, Beget new glories from thine ageless womb! The nations that in fettered
THE INDIAN GIPSY
IN tattered robes that hoard a glittering trace Of bygone colours, broidered to the knee, Behold her, daughter of a wandering race, Tameless, with the bold falcon’s agile grace, And the lithe tiger’s sinuous
Corn Grinders
O little mouse, why dost thou cry While merry stars laugh in the sky? Alas! alas! my lord is dead! Ah, who will ease my bitter pain? He went to seek a millet-grain In
Coromandel Fishers
Rise, brothers, rise; the wakening skies pray to the morning light, The wind lies asleep in the arms of the dawn like a child that has cried all night. Come, let us gather our
Humayun To Zobeida (From the Urdu)
You flaunt your beauty in the rose, your glory in the dawn, Your sweetness in the nightingale, your white – ness in the swan. You haunt my waking like a dream, my slumber like
Autumn Song
Like a joy on the heart of a sorrow, The sunset hangs on a cloud; A golden storm of glittering sheaves, Of fair and frail and fluttering leaves, The wild wind blows in a
In Salutation to the Eternal Peace
Men say the world is full of fear and hate, And all life’s ripening harvest-fields await The restless sickle of relentless fate. But I, sweet Soul, rejoice that I was born, When from the
The Royal Tombs Of Golconda
I MUSE among these silent fanes Whose spacious darkness guards your dust; Around me sleep the hoary plains That hold your ancient wars in trust. I pause, my dreaming spirit hears, Across the wind’s
Street Cries
WHEN dawn’s first cymbals beat upon the sky, Rousing the world to labour’s various cry, To tend the flock, to bind the mellowing grain, From ardent toil to forge a little gain, And fasting