Day 2 of Fast: Readings from Tagore

 

January 21, 2024, Day 2 of Fast

Readings from Tagore

I am going to read you a poem by Rabindranath Tagore which carries a message for us today. He had written it at the turn of the last century, just after the First World War.

 

“The Sunset of the Century” by Rabindranath Tagore

The last sun of the century sets

Amidst the blood-red clouds of the West, and the whirlwind of hatred

The naked passion of self-love of nations in its drunken delirium of greed is dancing to the clash of steel

And the howling verses of vengeance.

 

The hungry self of the nation shall burst in a violence of fury from its own shameless feeding,

For it has made the world its food

And licking it, crunching it, and swallowing it in big morsels, it swells and swells

Till in the midst of its unholy feast descends the sudden shaft of Heaven, piercing its heart of grossness

 

The crimson glow of light on the horizon, is not the glow of thy Dawn of Peace, my Motherland

It is the glimmer of the funeral pyre burning to ashes the vast flesh, the self-love of the nation,

Dead under its own excess.

Thy morning waits behind the patient dark of the East, meek and silent.

 

Keep watch India, bring your offerings of worship for that sacred sunrise

Let the first hymn of its welcome sound in your voice, and sing

Come Peace! Thou daughter of God’s own great suffering

Come with thy treasure of contentment, the sword of fortitude and meekness crowning thy forehead.

 

Be not ashamed, my brothers, to stand before the Proud and the Powerful, with your white robe of simpleness

Let your crown be of Humility, your freedom, the freedom of the Soul

 Build God’s throne daily, upon the ample bareness of your Poverty

And know that what is huge is not great, and pride is not everlasting.