Polvo de lenguaje, mas polvo creador

Éste es el noveno poema de Shesh Lekha ('Últimos escritos') de Tagore.


Goddess of language:
I carve your image single minded
in this lonely courtyard.
Lumps of clay
lie scattered:
unfinished, voiceless,
they stare at the vacant
without hope.
At the feet of your proud image
they lie humbled,
not knowing why they are there.
Yet more pitiful than them are those
who had once found form
but as time passed
lost all meaning.
Where were you invited?
They cannot answer.
To build which dream
they bore the debt of dust
and came
to the door of mankind?
From which lost paradise
this portrait of Urvashi
did the poet want to capture
on this mortal canvas?
For this you were called,
kept with care in this gallery of paintings
and then forgotten one day.

The primaveral dust you belong to
with supreme indifference claimed you
in its soundless chariot racing into the unknown.

This is good.
This tired acclaim,
crippled, waste today,
these routine humiliations
dog the steps of time
and interrupt its journey.
Spurned, insulted,
you find peace at last
when you become one with the dust again.

1941

Traducción: Pritish Nandy