The Gardener 68
None lives for ever, brother, and nothing lasts for long. Keepthat in mind and rejoice.Our life is not the one old burden, our path is not the one long journey.One sole poet has not to sing one aged song.The flower fades and dies; but he who wears the flower has not tomourn for it for ever.Brother, keep that in mind and rejoice.
There must come a full pause to weave perfection into music.Life droops toward its sunset to be drowned in the golden shadows.Love must be called from its play to drink sorrow and be borne tothe heaven of tears.Brother, keep that in mind and rejoice.
We hasten to gather our flowers lest they are plundered by the passing winds.It quickens our blood and brightens our eyes to snatch kisses thatwould vanish if we delayed.Our life is eager, our desires are keen, for time tolls the bell of parting.Brother, keep that in mind and rejoice.
There is not time for us to clasp a thing and crush it and flingit away to the dust.The hours trip rapidly away, hiding their dreams in their skirts.Our life is short; it yields but a few days for love.Were it for work and drudgery it would be endlessly long.Brother, keep that in mind and rejoice.
Beauty is sweet to us, because she dances to the same fleetingtune with our lives.Knowledge is precious to us, because we shall never have time to complete it.All is done and finished in the eternal Heaven.But earth's flowers of illusion are kept eternally fresh by death.Brother, keep that in mind and rejoice.
Words in this poem
- drudgery n.
- The act of drudging; disagreeable and wearisome labor; ignoble or slavish toil.
- endlessly adv.
- In an endless manner.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- eternally adv.
- In an eternal manner.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Gardener 68 is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Gardener, translated by the author from the original Bengali (Macmillan, London and New York, 1913; this text the 1915 printing), Project Gutenberg ebook #6686; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Rabindranath Tagore, The Gardener 68, in The Gardener (1913), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #6686, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/tagore-gardener/poem-68.html, id L27704.
About this section
The Gardener 68 is prose, printed in 5 paragraphs. It is part of the edition and is kept for reading, but nothing here is measured: the line breaks are the printer's, so no metre, rhyme scheme or scansion is stated.
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.