Niruddesh Jatra Traveling to an Unknown Destination(poem) by Tagore,Translation by Ranu

May 7, 2013

ocean (Photo credit: Stephen Edgar – Netweb)

How much further will you take me,pretty woman?

Tell me where will you dock your gold boat.

Whenever I say O stranger,

you only smile, pleasantly__

I fail to understand what’s on your mind.

Quietly you raise your finger

the vast ocean is agitated,

far in the distance the sun is setting.

What is there, what are we on the look-out for?

Tell me, O  foreign woman__

where the funeral pyre is burning,

the sparkling tremulous water,

in this direction the bride with tearful eyes,

what is there in your abode

on the bank of the resounding ocean

on the foot of the imaginary mountain?

You look at my face and smile without a reply.

The air heaves a deep sigh.

the flow-tide bellows .

The suspicious indigo water,

without looking I watch the shore,

as if  the overflowing deluge is oscillating.

Right after the gold boat appears,

followed by the evening_

in the middle of all this why dost thou smile quietly?

I fail to understand what brings you such pleasure.

When you beckoned who wants to accompany me__

I  looked at you for a moment that morning.

you showed the  flowing light

the vast ocean ,

the restless light trembling in the water.

I boarded the boat and asked__

is there young people over there,

is there hope for success ?

You looked and smiled.