Tagore’s Golden Skiff

Rabindranath Tagore’s work, ‘Sonar Tori’, is an allegory of a farmer representing each one of us, on judgement day. Thunder rumbles in the lowering sky as I sit alone with my large harvest of sheaves of corn on the bank of the river flowing fast; the rain had begun as I reaped all alone in my little farm, with water all around; the distant village across appears as if smeared in ink, in the murky morning gloom.

Hark! Who sings as he rows his skiff along with his sail billowing before the wind? He does not look around, as the waves break around him, but I think I know him. ‘O, who are you, and whither are you bound? Go wherever you care, but come ashore a while and please carry my golden sheaves away!’ I cry. ‘Take as much as you can,’ I say, as he comes near. ‘Is there more?’ asks he presently. ‘No,’ say I, ‘I have given you all I had. Now please have pity on me and take me along as well,’ I plead.

‘There’s no room! There’s no room!’ says he as he leaves — there’s space on his little boat only for my golden grain, but none for me. The dark monsoon clouds close in as I am left once again alone on the river bank.

The poem echoes the message given by Krishn in the Bhagwad Gita on nishkaam karma. Once apoet’s creation is done, it also belongs to the world at large.

May 9 is Rabindranath Tagore Jayanti