I said to myself, "Cease thy singing. Song is for one who is to come, the struggle without an end is for things that are." The road, that ever lies along like some one with ear to the ground listening for footsteps, to-day gleans no hint of coming guest, nothing of the house at its far end. My lute said, "Trample me in the dust." I looked at the dust by the roadside. There was a tiny flower among thorns. And I cried, "The world's hope is not dead!" The sky stooped over the horizon to whisper to the earth, and a hush of expectation filled the air. I saw the palm leaves clapping their hands to the beat of inaudible music, and the moon exchanged glances with the glistening silence of the lake. The road said to me, "Fear nothing!" and my lute said, "Lend me thy songs!" 34 TRANSLATIONS BAUL SONGS[1] [Footnote 1: The Bauls are a sect of religious mendicants in Bengal, unlettered and unconventional, whose songs are loved and sung by the people. The literal meaning of the word "Baul" is "the Mad."] 1 This longing to meet in the play of love, my Lover, is not only mine but yours. Your lips can smile, your flute make music, only through delight in my love; therefore you are importunate even as I. 2 I sit here on the road; do not ask me to walk further. If your love can be complete without mine let me turn back from seeking you. I refuse to beg a sight of you if you do not feel my need. I am blind with market dust and mid-day glare, and so wait, in hopes that your heart, my heart's lover, will send you to find me. 3 I am poured forth in living notes of joy and sorrow by your breath. Mornings and evenings in summer and in rains, I am fashioned to music. Should I be wholly spent in some flight of song, I shall not grieve, the tune is so dear to me. 4 My heart is a flute he has played on. If ever it fall into other hands let him fling it away. My lover's flute is dear to him, therefore if to-day alien breath have entered it and sounded strange notes, let him break it to pieces and strew the dust with them. 5 In love the aim is neither pain nor pleasure but love only. While free love binds, division destroys it, for love is what unites. Love is lit from love as fire from fire, but whence came the first flame? In your being it leaps under the rod of pain. Then, when the hidden fire flames forth, the in and the out are one and all barriers fall in ashes. Let the pain glow fiercely, burst from the heart and beat back darkness, need you be afraid? The poet says, "Who can buy love without paying its price? When you fail to give yourself you make the whole world miserly." 6 Eyes see only dust and earth, but feel with the heart, and know pure joy. The delights blossom on all sides in every form, but where is your heart's thread to make a wreath of them?