Before I crash to bed, I look for a book to put me to sleep. A little bit of Tagore - maybe. It is amazing how the same poems appear different during the day and in the night. During the day, Tagore is so soaked in sentiment that it is intolerable. Yet at night, when the world sleeps and in
Shelley's words I reside by brother death, Tagore gives me a different expereince. Divine, pristine, and redeeming. Away from sham, away from make-belief,
Tagore opens the door to peace - dropping all my guards and lulling my storm. Unashamed.
If the day is done,
If birds sing no more,
If the wind has flagged tired,
Then draw the veil of darkness thick upon me,
Even as thou hast wrapt the earth with the coverlet of sleep and
Tenderly closed the petals of the drooping lotus at dusk.
From the traveller,
Whose sack of provisions is empty before the voyage is ended,
Whose garment is torn and dustladen,
Whose strength is exhausted,
Remove shame and poverty, and renew his life
Like a flower under the cover of thy kindly night.
- Gitanjali
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