(As English Poetry) English Translation Sri. T N Ramachandran Thanjavur After my birth, since the hour I began to cultivate Words, I but contemplated Your roseate feet In excelling love. O blue-throated Lord-God Of the celestials, when will you uproot my misery? 1 My misery He may not uproot; pity me He may not; neither May He reveal to me the way; yet for our Lord Whose form is Light, and who decked with bones, dances In the fire, my heart’s love shall never suffer decrease. 2 In each birth we take we are His servitor alone; For ever our love is vouchsafed to Him only; we will serve none But Him, the One of dense, matted hair who sports An indivisible chip of the moon. May You rule us for ever. Note: In this verse, Siva who is spoken of in the third person, is invoked in the second person towards the end. 3 O Lord of long, ruddy and salvific form with a neck Divinely redeeming! O God who has us as His servitor! When we, Your servitor, make our grief known to you. How is it you turn a deaf ear? Lo, we are kin to none else. 4 It is God who evolves into existence all lives; it is God Who resolves all existing lives; it is God who annuls The cruel misery when it assails us and when we hail Him thus: “O Father! O Mother!” 5 Let them say He is of the supernal world; let them say He is of Indra’s world. He is truly the One of Gnosis. His throat is densely dark and effulgent, as, of yore, He quaffed venom. I affirm thus: “He abides in my bosom.” Note: The supreme one is sometimes indentified as Indra by the Rg Veda. 6 I indeed am blessed with tapas; truly good is my heart; I indeed have contemplated birthlessness; I have truly become The servitor of him, the triple-eyed One who is adorned With the white ash and is mantled in the tusker’s hide. tapas : Rigorous practice of religious austerities. This (in the words of Shelley) can he achieved: “………………. by dreadful abstinence And conquering penance of the mutinous flesh, Deep contemplation and unwearied study In years outstretched beyond the date of man.” 7 That very day I became His bonded slave; The Lord-Ruler, in approval thereof received that day The pure-watered Ganga; this is thanks to His grace who holds the fire In His beauteous palm and who is like an auric mountain. Note : Receiving water in one’s hand betokens acceptance of a gift. 8 It is Grace that rules all the worlds; if the grace of Lord Deigns to snap the cycle of transmigration, I will, by the grace Of Grace, be destined to behold the True Ens; For eve, it is Grace which is to me all things. 9 He is my sweet Lord; He is God: it is Him I hold for ever As my embosomed treasure; even as I acknowledged Him As my Lord-God, I revelled in ecstasy. Is thee aught impossible for me? 10 I but contemplated one thing; to one thing alone I held fast Resolutely; into my heart I locked but one thing. Behold it! It is servitorship to Him of bright and beauteous hands Who in His radiant crown sports the Ganga and the crescent. 11 THAT is the Lord who enslaves devotees; if henceforth We comprehend THAT, we will come to know the greatness Of THAT—the One who wears the moist wreaths and sports The peerless eye in His bright forehead. 12 If He is truly great, it is nefandous on His part to suffer The snake to roam about His chest; should the huge snake That rolls freely, one day reach the Daughter of the Mountain, Ha, it will indeed be mighty sinful. 13 My peerless heart, of itself, will comtemplate Him Of the great snake that bedecks His radiant chest And emits venom like unto swelling flame. By itself my heart will save itself and gain redemption. Note : The idea is that Lord Siva who shelters a venomous Serpent, will certainly offer refuge to a soul purged Of its venom. 14 The celestials gain not at-one-ment with His feet, though they Contemplate Him, adorning His feet with abundant blooms. I know not how He will grace me, the one that merely says: “O Lord of fulgurant matted hair!O Lord Brahmin!” Note : The message is this: “How can lip-service succeed Where manual service has failed?” 15 From now on we stand redeemed; we are blessed with the grace Of the Lord; o heart, no more will we suffer; we have now Crossed the roaring ocean of interminable transmigration Which mothers the sea of Karma. 16 Hara who is the Primal Cause of the hoary world, can be Beheld by them that fold their hands in adoration And by them that eye Him in love; He manifests As light in their chinta who see Him with their inner eye. Chinta: mind-heart. 17 With His unique toe He quelled the might of the Asura; Shall I call Him Hara or the Four-faced Or Hari the supreme one? Alas, I canst not, this day, Comprehend His (multifoliate) Godliness. 18 He wears a never-ageing crescent; He becomes the worlds Three times seven; as of yore, He was beyond the ken Of Vishnu and Brahma’s comprehension; yet for us, He is easy of access even to this day. 19 He s the knower; He is the Paraclete; He is the Buddhi That understand; He indeed is the reality that is apperceived; He is sun, (moon), earth, (water, fire, air) and ether; it is Indeed He who is all these. Note : It is Ashta Moorti—the God of Saiva Siddhantam--, who is hailed here and the succeeding verse. Kalidasa holds Him as the Supreme Lord of the universe “who stands revealed in these eight forms. Vide Sakunatala (Prologue). 20 He indeed becomes the two lights, the fire and the ether too; He, it is, who becomes earth, water and air; He indeed is The soul and the Ashta Moorti; truly it is He Who abides as the Lord of Gnosis. 21 O Lord whose neck is dark like a cloud that floats At night! O Lord, be pleased to scrutinize the intent Of this dazzling serpent! It means to devour this, The young crescent that rests in Your crest. 22 Though the Lord who sports the crescent, the flood, the fire And the adder, pities us not, this heart inseparable From our Father will rest content as it is for ever bound In service to the blue-throated-- our Father. 23 O Lord, You abide in my soul in a fulgurant form; It is this form which spins and irradiates thither; This indeed, O Lord, becomes Your divinely beauteous form; This indeed is the treasure—aidant and remediate. 24 Our Lord, oblivious of His glory, goes abegging in sundry ways; At night when darkness swells, He dances I the crematory. Why does He do so? This we will probe into that day when We behold Him. Of what avail are our words now uttered here? 25 The Lord’s curly strands of dangling matted hair flash Like the lightnings on the crest of auric mountain; On His golden chest-whose throat is blue, the dangling snakes, Amidst garlands of bones, dazzle like lightning on Meru’s sides. 26 O One that destroyed the might and the three citadels Of foes with a single dart! Desist from wearing on Your chest A snake for jewel; deign to wear instead a jewel of gold. Do we not urge and hail you with this, our prayer, for days one end? 27 He wears a killer-serpent for a jewel; He wears another As a bright girdle over His tiger-skin Vestment; He wears yet another on His beauteous and golden crown. Are these to jeopardize me—the senseless one? 28 Others who behold his flower-red body bedaubed With ash, decked with bones and looking like a ghoul’s, Canst not comprehend the truth about Him. Are these to dispraise Him? Lo, discern the truth. Cf. “… Naanila Amanarar pazhipputaiyaro namakku Atikalaakiya Atikale? (Is our Lord-God to be sneered at By the shameless Samanas?)—ST. Sundarar. 29 Wearing the bones of others, our Lord delightfully dances During night in the fire of the crematory witnessed by joyous And mighty ghouls; His greatness canst not be known By others; He is realized by devotees as the Great Consciousness. 30 O bashful heart! He wears bones and is never selective About it; may you augment your love for His servitorship; Rejoice in this; you will thrive among the great; you have Indeed secured for yourself the great Palladium. 31 Look well! The sacred thread on His chest—the Primal Ens, The triple-eyed that, of yore, gutted with fire the three citadels--, Is like a ray flowing from the young moon He wears On His effulgent and hirsutorufous crown. 32 Let the ignorant lot rave bookishly; the greatness Of the Lord whose neck is sapphire-like is peerless. Whose performs whatsoever tapas to behold Him as he desires, It is He who manifests before him in the desired form. Cf. “Who is the Deity that you own? Know, it is but the Lord who is concorporate with His consort that visits you Assuming the form of your Deity.” - Sivagnana Siddhyar, Supakkam, 115 33 Abiding in the heavens, they failed to own themselves as His servitors And hail Him; with a single arrow He smote their three towns. Cruel Karma, irrespective of their station, will smite them Who fail to think of Him and gain His propinquity. 34 The blue patch on the ruby-like neck of the Supreme One adorned With a hooded snake of beautiful neck and open mouth, Looks as though that murk afraid of its annihilation By the argent moon has found a secure refuge thither. 35 O Lord with a blued neck! The young moon is scared Of the serpent on Your long matted hair, thinking That the serpent may slither with speed to seize and kill it any day. Alas! Day by day it is fated to wane and not thrive. 36 He of the growing matted hair that sports a crescent, smote The three great citadels of Asuras who haild Him not; it men Consciously adore Him, never dispraising His skeleton-outfit, They will be free from embodiment with bones. 37 Does not the sharp and shiny tusk of the black boar Adorning His bosom that has for garland a crawling snake, Look like the remaining digit of the moon of the bright sky That is being devoured by the dazzling serpent? 38 The lovely coralline body of the handsome One who is Concorporate with Her—a flowery twig--, is like A beauteous hill of ruddy gold, when it is not adorned With ash; if adorned, it then looks like an argent hill. 39 O fond heart! He wore the crescent as His chaplet, ignored By all others; contemplate the feet of them that are His servitors; do articulate their praise; beware the crowd That is unmindful of His servitorship; avoid it. 40 O poor ones! You are unaware of the truth that it is easy To lead a life enshrining within you the bright And blue-throated Lord who adorned with a serpent, roams At will. Alas, alas, pity it is that you should be ignorant! 41 On one side of Your body is Vishnu who measured the worlds; On the other is Uma; such is Your body that on neither of either Do we discern Your hue of redness. Is then Your hue of the lightning’s, Linked as You are with those two whose hue is those of the nimbus?42 This is a body-crescent! Is it reduced to this Smallness, snake-bitten? Or did You slice it To this dinky size to suit Your crest? Alas, will it not, Like a healthy babe grow from strength to strength, at all? 43 You are the omniscient Lord; You go begging For paltry alms; Devas of soaring lustre should hail You Thus: “O our Lord! Pray, seek not such alms.” If even they Canst not prevent You, are we valiant to forfend Your begging? 44 He the glorious One, is sweet to our manam; He is the Consort Of Ganga; He is the celebrated One of incarnadine hue; He is the Lord of gods; unto Him am I a slave; He is my refuge; Him I serve; yet, how is it that He does not choose to grace me? Note : Manam is not mind. Manam is insentient. Mind is consciousness. 45 O ye that pursue the great path leading to the Lord’s darsha! O ye that seek but His great grace! If you ask: “Where may the Lord be?” I will say that He is poised in the chinta Of devotee like me; it is easy to behold Him through love. 46 O fond heart! He is concorporate with Her whose twin eyes Like the two symmetrically-slit slices of a tender mango. The beatitude of gaining His divine feet is through His grace only. You, O fool, canst not reach them by your effort. 47 Deeming it the crescent, the senseless serpent beholds One day the tusk on His divine chest; on another day, It eyes His beauteous crescent; however till this day, It knows not what indeed is truly the crescent. 48 As on the crest of the Lord who alone is His equal, The rays of the beauteous and young crescent spread, Do not the strands of His matted hair look like The twisted threads of gold and silver? 49 The dangling blue locks of Paarvati who is Concorporate with the Lord that wears on the right side Of His crest the lovely crescent, look like the fruit Of konrai with which the Lord adorns His matted hair. 50 During the great night of Dissolution when You are To dance in the fierce fire of the great Crematorium Do not fare forth thither concorporate with the bangled Beauty whose plaited hair flows down Her nape. 51 Should a myriad moons rise beautifully throughout The ruddy sky, that will not at all match the glory Of the chaplet of skulls worn on the hirsutorufous crest Of Him who has the red-eyed Vishnu as part of his body. 52 The beauteous crown of our Lord who is cinctured With the cord of a belligerent serpent, teems with konrai; There, full of water, a river flows flooding; His crest Is a nimbus of the rainy season unto beholders. 53 O our triple-eyed Lord whose throat is dark like a nimbus! He is part of Your body; his dark frame looks as though It were wrought of watery cloud; he is subsumed in you. Yet, how did You, of yore, remain unbeknown to him? 54 You wear a scar on Your neck as you quaffed the venom Of ocean, of yore, whilst Devas witnessed it trembling. Lo, the milky moon on Your ruddy, matted hair where The snake crawls, eke doth wear a scar in its frame. 55 O Lord whose hue is white like the burnt ash! O One That wears on the crown the white crescent! We have heard The dispraise that You eat Your alms from out of the white Stinking skull. Answer us: “Do You deem this blameless?” 56 Even if You go abegging through the entire world, Do not fare forth with Your cruel snakes; if snakes Full of poison, dance on Your person, innocent women Will not give You alms scared by the snakes. 57 Great crackling fire and abundantly swelling darkness, Even if juxtaposed, cannot match the glory of the Lord whose Matted hair is ruddy and whose beauteous body like Unto the crimson sky, is shared by Her of flowery locks. 58 O triple-eyed and blue-throated Lord! O Rider of the Bull! You adorn Your person with the ash. Is it on the side of Uma Concorporate with You or on the other side which is Vishnu’s? I know not on whose part it is! Deign to enlighten me. 59 Even if lofty clouds gather and hide the effulgence of Meru That will not parallel the act of the Lord, who of yore, mantled His divine person with the dark hide of the bewildered And ichorous pachyderm of enormous trunk. 60 Without beholding Your divine form, I—all unregenerate--, Became Your servitor that day; this day too, when I stand Redeemed I have not beheld it. if men ask me: “What may Your Lord’s form be?” What can I say? What indeed is Your form Note : This verse furnished the clue to St. Sekkkizhaar who affirmed that this “Antaati” was sung by St. Peyaar the moment she was blessed with the prayed for skeletal form. 61 When on earth that day You stood a hunter with a bow To fight against Arjuna, with what did Your form Of a fierce hunter agree or disagree? What did agree Or disagree with its nature? Who can tell? 62 O Lord of ineffable effulgence! Does the crescent On Your crest, rivaling the ruddy and beauteous sun Roam about the live-long day a long distance Burning bright? Please enlighten me. 63 Will the serpent that enters Your crest which is Like the incarnadine sky endowed with the crescent, Go round and round the white-rayed moon, As on the day of eclipse, to seize it? 64 His body is resplendent like the morn; the white ash On his person is like the fierce day; the strands Of His matted hair are like the crepuscular sky; His neck is like the night of swelling darkness. 65 O Lord, You hold the venom in Your neck; it Your chest With outspread hood the snake dances. Did it come By venom in its throat by licking Your neck? Or does it By nature have a black neck? Please enlighten me. 66 The snake, the crescent, the fawn the leaping tiger And the down-descending flood are borne by Him in amity. It is but fitting that the triple-eyed Lord of bright auric hue Should sport a beauteous heroic anklet above His divine foot. 67 To appease Her bouderie who is ankleted, the Lord That wears a young crescent, falls at Her feet that are Dyed red with silk-cotton, and thrives; so it is that His crest Is more beautifully incarnadine than the russet sky. 68 As we wear on our head the divine feet of the Lord who is Triple-eyed and whose crest sports a curvaceous crescent, We ignore Death; on earth with His servitorship we are Blessed; henceforth is thee aught of misery for us? 69 Our Father whose fulgurant stands of matted hair wave ablaze! May You be pleased to reveal one day the place where You leap Amidst fire, and dance during densely dark night! This one great desire for ever haunts us. 70 Note : The place is the crematory at Tiruaalangkaadu. O triple-eyed Lord! You keep the crescent that rises In the spacious sky, near the bashful damsel Ganga; They are visible to us; we are unable to eye the Mountain’s Daughter In Your left; You alone are exclusively beholding Her. 71 O One that wears a chip of the skyey moon! O Eye of Grace Unto the heptad of great worlds! If I canst not behold You, Hail You as Father and render You manual service, I desire not Heavenly life even if I come by it; this is my conviction. 72 O heart, for ever and in love hail the lotus-feet Of Him who received on His crest the flood Ganga Of swelling waves; you will surely and squarely Come by all things sought after; this I affirm. 73 Your spacious begging-bowl-the skull--, was not a whit Filled, by all the food that was cooked using the vast seas As boiling water; yet how came it to be filled when, unaware Of its greatness, innocent women poured their alms into it? 74 Truly the flowing matted hair of the Lord—the abode Of all good--, is like the heaven as thither the muddy Ganga meanders, the bright moon floats and the snakes— Raku and Ketu--, crawl over His immense crest. Raku ( Pronounced Raahu) : The ascending node. Ketu : The descending node. 75 As the bright, auric and gem-inlaid crowns Of the Devas who are blessed to dwell in the supernal world Rub against Your lotus-like and beauteous feet, they are Full of scars and tender. What a pity, O our Father! Cf. “My father’s feet were nobly scarred, …… Scarred with the crowns of vassaled heads…” - Nala Venpa, Tr, Maurice Langton. 76 O Lord, when You lift Yoor foot the nether world gets unhinged; When You shake Your head, the vault of heaven bursts; When You flex Your braceleted hand the great directions Are rent; the forum trembles; pray dance with care. 77 O poor one, will the Lord who dances in the crematory of ghouls Gratuitously grant grace to all lives? If it be so, unto those That hail Him for many days, what beatitude will He not Grant? What worlds will He not bestow? 78 My chinta is elated with pride. Is it because I bow At the feet of the Lord of spreading matted hair, Adorn them with blooms, hail Him and steadfastly Remain posed in His—our Father’s servitorship? 79 His are the triumphant feet that kicked Death away; they crushed Straighaway the many-shouldered Asura who by pride upborne Durst uproot the Mountain; they were invisible to godly Maal And Ayan who to behold them hailed them in rapture. 80 Getting attached to the lotus feet of Him who sped a dart That spat cruel fire and burnt and destroyed the three Beauteous citadels of the sky, we have conquered Death, Done away with cruel inferno and uprooted the twofold karma. 81 The lightning-like lass affirms: “Truly understood the flame-hued One’s strands of matted hair which put to shame the ruddy rays Of the setting sun, are like auric shoots to those that take refuge In Him; to those who move away from Him, they are tongues of fire. 82 If asked: “What will it be like when He of the fulgurant and ruddy Matted hair gets concorporate with Vishnu?” (The answer is) “It will be like the close and immense juxtaposition of the golden Mountain which is like Him and the mountain of sapphire.” 83 The eyes of the Triple-eyed are Agni of swelling flame, Chandra of cool rays and Surya of painful and fierce rays; It is the eye in His forehead that witnessed the destruction By fire, of the three citadels of the cruel and hostile Asuras. 84 If I behold the great Lord, will I eye Him longingly, Fold my hands in ardent obeisance and think on Him Impassioned? Will I hail Him thus: “O Dancer in the fire! O Lord of the Empyrean!” and feel ecstatic? 85 He sports a vertical eye in His forehead revealing a little of it; We have become one among His lofty Bhootha-Host; Whether this beatitude lasts or not we desire not Aught else though we can come by it. 86 If we deck the golden feet of our Lord with garlands Woven of hymns and blooms, and if we, by love, gain Peerless Gnosis, what will become of the murk that is Ever-assailing Karma? Surely it will cease. 87 O Lord who blesses us with goodly grace! O One that sports The bright crescent on Your hirsutorufous matted crest! How shall I describe the blaze of Your neck? Is it the very form Of darkness, or a great nimbus, or a flawless sapphire? 88 You looked the puissant Manmatan of bright bow Into cinders! You abide in clarified chinta! How is it That Your neck alone turned dark whilst the mouth That ate the bright venom is as it ever is? Unriddle this. 89 O our Father, tell us what You will do when the billowy Ganga That rolls on drawing the white crescent and the bright, Fierce-looking, raging and crawling serpent, begins To swell and destroy Your cool crescent and overflow? 90 Lo, as a servitor unto the roseate feet of Him in whose ruddy Matted hair, the billowy Ganga flows, chanting the mystic pentad, We comprehended Him; all things needed here and hereafter Are ours. Why do you talk ill of us behind our back? 91 He of the pure matted hair whose curls look as though they are Wrought of gold, is the One who is the treasure that dispenses Grace to the celestials; it is He who owns me; He, the one And only God, stands apart; He is unaware of His greatness. 92 O goodly heart! It is He who is the Lord of the celestials; His complexion is like the beauteous coral; It is His neck that has a dark patch; unto Him, In true love, be ever linked. 93 O Lord who rides a cloud-like massive bull! You part not From the Mountain’s Daughter. Is it because of Her great longing For You? Is it because You have no place to go? Or does She Fear to remain alone, parted from You? Please enlighten us. 94 She, the Lady of a great family, parts not from Your frame; So too is she who is Ganga. O Lord who is with white ash And bones adorned! You part from neither of them; Be pleased to tell us, who of the two, is closer to You in love? 95 We have with the mantle of love concealed Him Who is Hara; by our glorious kinship and by gramarye We have, in our peerless heart, concealed Him from view- Who indeed can henceforth behold Him at all? 96 At the end of Yuga You rage and burn up with swelling fire The universe; have You (now) kept the ruddy fire That invaded the three worlds, hidden in the seven worlds? Or with great valiancy do You hold it in Your palm? Yuga : The aecon. 97 Holding fire You dance to the tinkling of Your heroic anklet In the fire of the crematory where ghouls dance. Did Your hand turn red as it held the fire? Or did the fire Grow ruddy from its contact with Your beauteous palm? Unriddle this. Cf. Did the effulgence of your visage burgeon as that Of your crown’s? Did the effulgence of your feet burgeon As that of the blown lotus-pedastal? Did the effulgence Of your beauteous waist merge with the natural radiance Of your vestments and jewels? O Lord of Sri, clarify this. - Nammaazhwar. 98 O One who sports a five-headed serpent that spits venom With its mouth agape! Is it for the beholding of Her Of lovely young breasts or for that of the throngs of ghouls In the fiery crematory, that You dance? For whose sake this dance? 99 O Golden-hued! When Your bull walks, earth trembles; ablaze is The direction when it looks thitherward; when it bellows The whole word gets scared. Is Your mount a lion of the mountain Or a skiey thunderbolt or truly a bull? Clarify this. Note : In Tamil, YeRu means bull. When this is suffixed to urum (lightning) or idi (thunder), it means thunderbolt. 100 They that hail this garland of anaphoretic venpa verses Woven with melting love by Kaaraikkaal Pey, will in love Insatiate, reach the presence of the merciful Lord And hail Him in unending devotion ever after. 101 Sincere thanks to Sri. T N Ramachandran of thanjavur, who has translated this holy composition to English, for permitting English translation of Arpudhath Thiruvandhathi be published here. அற்புதத் திருவந்தாதி (11th Thirumurai - Original Tamil Script)