Seven Hundred Elegant Verses. Govardhana
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they even let go of the nectar.*
Victory to the love games of Lakshmi when she is blinded by passion! A serpent serves as her bed, Garuda is ignored, Brahma gets hit by her necklace, and she inhales the fumes of the serpent’s hundred hoods.*
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Victory to Lakshmi’s passionate visualizing of Mohini while making love in the male position! It was inferred by Vishnu, who smiled ⋮ from her smiling face since he was familiar with outward signs.*
Victory to Brahma! Inside the lotus from the navel, cooled by spray and the breathing of Lakshmi, whose eagerness for sexual play has been satisfied, with the humming of numerous bees as his snoring, he lies asleep.*
Victory to you with the single tusk, two mothers, beyond the three gunas, with four arms and yet with five hands, respected by Him with Six Faces, with ichor that is fragrant like the seven-leaved tree, and son of Him with Eight Bodies!*
Be devoted without arrogance to Him with the Elephant’s Face! He has two frontal lobes that resemble auspicious vessels, and the bees, agitating for his ichor, become like sesame seeds.*
Prostrate yourselves before lovely women and Kama, for both are skilled in crooked behavior: by them Love, the bodiless, is provided with a body ⋮ equipped with helpers, and by him women are provided with weapons ⋮ turned into men!*
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I pay my respects to the poet who arose from an anthill; his poem abounds in manifold ornamentation, radiates with many sound effects and is oblique in expression, like the rainbow, Indra’s bow which appears as an ornament for the clouds, shines forth with many colors, is curved and arose from an anthill.*
I honor the Maha·bharata, which is the concentrate of Vya- sa’s words and the essence of the universe; since Bharati’s name bears its imprint, she holds that name to be her ornament.*
When there is the Ramayana filled with poetic sentiment that elevates the lineage of Kakut·stha, what use do we have for any other? Why should a rivulet spring up, when there is the mighty flow of the Ganges with its abundant water?*
Alas! Vyasa ruined his reputation because he made the mistake of living too long. Otherwise, who would not think that he had acquired a new body as Gunadhya?*
We salute the poets of the Ramayana, Maha·bharata and the Brihat·katha. It is due to them that the Sarasvati, with abundant water, shines forth as if it had become the three-streamed Ganges ⋮ that sacred speech, filled with poetic sentiments, appears to be broken up into three traditions.*
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The game of making love and the words of Kali·dasa give delight even as one is learning them: they are like the sounds in the throats of beautiful women, tender and sweet in their implications.
Through her connection with Bhava·bhuti, Speech manifests herself as a river; for otherwise how would “the stones weep” in the tragedy he composed?*
I suppose that just as Shikhandini was reborn as Shikhandin, Speech was born as Bana to enhance her powers as a male.*
I pay my respects to my father Nilambara, who is reckoned right after the teacher Prabhakara, after whose death righteousness and ritual have lain dormant, who was a poet like Ushanas, who is honored right after the teacher of the gods, Brihas·pati, at whose setting religion and ritual observance are reduced to a minimum, who is a deity like Shukra.*
They alone are capable of accomplishing the encylopedia of arts and skills and of displaying all segments of the moon, the lotuses’ friend: the king who is the crest-jewel of the Sena lineage and the early morning of a full-moon day.
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If their syllables are harmonious ⋮ if they show enduring friendship, if they are not harsh, if they are not uncouth, words of poetry, just like men, effectively indicate their meaning.
A blemish will not enter the heart of the good, suffused with sentiment, just as a woodworm will not enter a bamboo. But a fault-finder will not welcome even aesthetic delight, just as a man whose humors are morbidly deranged will refuse to accept even water.*
Even a poem of no merit is delightful if it is on the lips of the good; even a blowing sound captivates the ear if it is modulated by a good flute.
Even though it is itself filled with holes ⋮ failings, and shakes from side to side ⋮ is fickle to everyone, the sieve, jealous of the grain, has been appointed to separate ⋮ discern the chaff.
The water ⋮ poetic sentiment of a poem or a river brings no joy to connoisseurs of rasa if it lacks clarity, and fails to reveal the things or meanings contained within it.
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Inaccessible to the stupid ⋮ wicked; comparable to nectar ⋮ pervaded by immortality; composed of euphonies ⋮ made of gold etc.; dealing with emotional themes ⋮ containing the crowds of gods; poetry or heaven, we realize them to be alike.*
Satisfied by the cooked rice of words, from which the true poet’s tongue has winnowed the chaff, a man would not care even for the lower lip of his beloved. What nectar is a servant girl?
An elegant poem, with exquisite amorous sentiment, gives as much pleasure as a woman rushing to an assignation, even though it contains no rhetorical ornaments of sound ⋮ she pays no heed to the tinkling of her ornaments, even though it is bluntly to the point ⋮ she is doing her lover’s bidding, even though the meter is uneven ⋮ her footsteps are faltering.
Neither the poem nor the anklet gives delight either to the heart or to the ear, in the congregation of the learned and at the time of making love, if it contains no suggestion ⋮ does not make a noise and is merely out to string words together ⋮ clings lifelessly to the ankle.*
Poems are sweet only for the man who has tasted the nectarlike juices of his beloved’s lip: the cuckoo who has not picked at the buds of the mango cannot sing pleasantly.*
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The girl’s side-long glance has given the gist; the commentary has been supplied by the wanton woman’s furtive glance; the go-between has explained; the boy-poet studies the purport ⋮ learns about love.
Go·vardhana’s clear verses ⋮ fair noble ladies deploy smooth expressions and style ⋮ walk with smooth gait and soft tread to the hearts of good men ⋮ keep trysts with their noble lovers, are full of sentiment, are esoteric texts on the unity of love ⋮ keep close in the unity of love-making.
Speech with the poetic sentiments associated with Prakrit ⋮ that has sentiments relished by vulgar people has been by great effort turned into Sanskrit ⋮ brought to the sophisticated man as by Bala·rama the Yamuna river whose water was flowing downwards was raised to the sky.*
The arrogant persons who scorn this “Seven Hundred of Elegant Verses” will never enter the heart of the beloved, just like those who have no go-between.
Just as one’s beloved, though naked, when in the course of making love she has shed all her clothes, grants pleasure when filled with passion, so speech, though plain, causes delight, if full of sentiment; when void of emotion, though filled with figures of speech, it will not give enjoyment, like a wooden doll, even if it is ornamented.
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irl guarding the well! Do cover up your breasts— those mountains that block the road—that are impossible to by-pass. Give the travelers’ wives a chance to survive, for their lives will last no longer than the date fixed for the return.*
When the young co-wife began to develop breasts, the lady of the house suddenly became extremely affectionate towards their husband, pleasant, meticulous about serving him, in harmony with his ideas, and very polite.
Be loud and noisy with your waves, those scoundrels that uprooted the nichula bushes on your bank! Kaveri! In no time you will be no more than mud that even the storks spit