From Afar

Rabindranath Tagore 1861 (Kolkata) – 1941 (Kolkata)



The 'I' that floats along the wave of time,
From a distance I watch him.
With the dust and the water,
With the fruit and the flower,
With the All he is rushing forward.
He is always on the surface,
Tossed by the waves and dancing to the rhythm
Of joy and suffering.
The least loss makes him suffer,
The least wound hurts him--
Him I see from afar.
That 'I' is not my real self;
I am still within myself,
I do not float in the stream of death.
I am free, I am desireless,
I am peace, I am illumined--
Him I see from afar.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 30, 2023

32 sec read
120

Quick analysis:

Scheme abccdefgcbHiijekH
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 528
Words 109
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 17

Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore FRAS was an Indian polymath—poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. He reshaped Bengali literature and music as well as Indian art with Contextual Modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. more…

All Rabindranath Tagore poems | Rabindranath Tagore Books

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    "From Afar" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Mar. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/29443/from-afar>.

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