Tirumantiram - TANTRA ONE - 4 TRANSITORINESS OF YOUTH

Tirumantiram

English translation of the Tamil Spiritual Classic by Saint Tirumular

 

TANTRA ONE

4 TRANSITORINESS OF YOUTH

 

177: Rising Sun Sets; Glowing Youth Fades

 

They see the sun rises in the east and sets in the west,

Yet blind of eye, the truth they ne'er apprehend,

The tender calf grows, fattens for a while and dies;

But this wonder-pageant of the world they do not comprehend.

 

 

178: Even a Life-time is not Enough to Know Him

 

The years roll; but none the Lord in his bosom holds;

None to probe and perceive Him profound;

Even if Time's thread be to the utmost stretched,

Still they know not the spark that kindles all the lamps around.

 

 

179: While Life Still Throbs, Fix Your Mind on Lord

 

When youth had danced its way to palsied age,

Scarce the chance to fill the years with good deeds more and more;

So while life still throbs, fix your mind on Nandi,

Into whose spreading locks

The holy waters of Ganga eternally pour.

 

 

180: Youth is Sugar-cane; Age is Nux Vomica

 

Time was when fond damsels on him their love bestowed;

Like cane's sugary juice, slow sucked, was he to them,

The idol of wenches with budding breasts and jewelled shapes;

But now the sweetest cane has bitter nux vomica become.

 

 

181: Time Fleets, So Center on Lord

 

The boy grows to youth, and youth as surely to old age decays,

But time's changes teach them not that nothing abides;

And so, in ceaseless pursuit, His Sacred Feet, I seek

Him who, transcending this world, beyond the universe presides.

 

 

182: Think of Lord Through Time's Cycles

 

Day after day we wake to greet the morn,

Day after day we seek the nightly couch;

Even though God, good and great, may frown in wrath,

True devotees ne'er miss His great Love's avouch.

 

 

183: Subdue the Senses, Birth Cycle Ends

 

The five needles thick, this bag of senses holds

The five needles thick in this bestial body roam free;

If the five needles thick you tame and subdue,

No more this bag that life's cycle involves.

 

 

184: Deeds in Youth Seal Fate's End

 

They know not that the radiant Sun we daily see

Measures the arch of life and its span doth appraise;

Heaven we reach or fall into Karma's grip;

Thus our fate is sealed by what we do in spring of youth.

 

 

185: The Sixteen Kalas are Within; Why Then the Grave?

 

The ignorant ponder not even awhile,

The Kalas twice-eight within them stand;

When Death sets his snare-pit for them to fall,

Headlong they drop to utter stupefaction abandoned.

 

 

186: Before Youth Passes, Praise Him in Songs

 

In the days assigned to you, before youth passes,

In songs of praise to the Lord, pour out your heart;

In the days to me assigned, wasting not the minutes away,

In the days to me assigned, I, seeing all, remained apart.