I read some of the prose writings of Rabindranath Tagore but apart from Geetanjali I hardly read any of his poems. When I started with Stray birds, the flow just went on. These are mostly one or two line poems describe the life in the universe with a philosophical touch in Tagore’s style.

Here are some of them stayed in my mind like the caged birds and how I looked at them and interpreted.

                If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars

If you worry about the failures, it stops yours progression. Do the detached work, leave about the result. It is easy to say but hard to have but it does not matter whether you drowned for a moment with failure or not but what matters is how fast you could come out of it. Learn from it, evolve. Failures are not the stepping stones but the learning from the failures are.

           “What language is thine, O sea?”

            “The language of eternal question.”

             “What language is thy answer, O sky?

             “The language of eternal silence.”

Sea and Sky are the two distant elements for each other. Sea speaks endlessly; Sky is silent. Human progression started the moment man started thinking. He constantly questions over an infinite period of time, he was answered but answers brought many questions along with them. A silence pervaded, the cycle continued. The dual-, voice and silence paved the path of evolution. Another poem can be blended here, “The mystery of creation is like the darkness of night–it is great. Delusions of knowledge are like the fog of the morning.”

             They throw their shadows before them who carry their lantern on their back.

If those who are ignorant lead us, they can take us to darkness. How relevant it is to present times ? Our rulers are ignorant taking us to the darkness, but actual darkness is our ignorance about ignorance of our rulers.

            God expects answers for the flowers he sends us, not for the sun and the earth

Before speaking about the destruction of our planet on a larger spectrum, if we make our self answerable to what we are doing everyday to each and every part of the nature with our insane activities then we can proudly say Humans are more evolved than other creatures.

                                  The dry river-bed finds no thanks for its past.

Opportunism of mankind.

                        The bird wishes it were a cloud. The cloud wishes it were a bird.

Every day of our life, every one of us, in every situation keeps on itching our self with this nature. We worry about what we are not rather keeping the identity of what we are.

                       Do not linger to gather flowers to keep them, but walk on, for flowers will keep themselves blooming all your way.

Nature is ever changing. Let us not try to stuck at only one virtue of it, keep filling our vessel with it and trying to hold it rather enjoy what it comes to you at every instance of life, for nature fills your life vessel with the nectar of pleasure.

                  Roots are the branches down in the earth. Branches are roots in the air.

The evolution ! Seed evolves into the tree and tree was involved in the seed.

 1. “Who is there to take up my duties?” asked the setting sun. “I shall do what I can, my Master,” said the earthen lamp.

       2.  “The learned say that your lights will one day be no more.” said the firefly to the stars. The stars made no answer.

          3.   The root below the earth claim no reward for making the branches fruitful

Human history is a never ending road, many appeared as signal posts on it. Our job is to be a part in carrying forward to an extent one can. Theory of evolution doesn’t mean studying how man came from monkey, it is learning about how we have to be superior than our ancestors in every aspect rather bragging on achievements all over the history we had no part in. Giants are they who rejuvenate human history but saints are they who say it is their duty and ask no reward for it.

1.  God loves man’s lamp lights better than his own great starts

              2. The eyes are not proud of their sight but of their eyeglasses.

Man’s creation always has a special significance than God’s but our temper goes up even for a small achievement.

                           The fish in the water is silent, the animal on the earth is noisy, the bird in the air is singing, But Man has in him the silence of the sea, the noise of the earth and the music of the air.

Words are mere for this, it has to be felt.

                   Man’s history is waiting in patience for the triumph of the insulted man.

I have a context here, Human history is waiting for the morality in the oppressed man after his victory.

1.  Rest belongs to the work as the eyelids to the eyes.

           2.  Death belongs to life as birth does. The walk is in the raising of the foot as in the laying of it down.

          3.  Let life be beautiful like summer flowers and death like autumn leaves.

         4.  I shall die again and again to know that life is inexhaustible.

         5. We shall know some day that death can never rob us of that which our soul has gained, for her gains are one with herself.

It is all life, everything has its significance, see as they are. We live in this world when we love it.

 

These are some of them out of 300+ poems. I would be putting few more when I have time.