Abhanga 2590
The false-talker's speech has no taste and no real exchange; this is less personal villainy than a failure of formation — parents did not seize the time, temperament runs unchecked, mind grabs at quickness, and sin lands without a corresponding crime.
The verse
लटिक्याचे वाणी चवी ना संवाद । नांहीं कोणां वाद रुचों येत ॥१॥
अन्याय तो त्याचा नव्हे वायचाळा । मायबापीं वेळा न साधिली ॥ध्रु.॥
अनावर अंगीं प्रबळ अवगुण । तांतडीनें मन लाहो साधी ॥२॥
तुका म्हणे दोष आणि अवकळा । न पडतां ताळा घडे तसे ॥३॥
Literal translation
The false one's speech has no taste, no real exchange; nobody finds his dispute palatable. The fault is not his alone, the empty-talker's — the parents did not seize the time. Ungovernable, powerful bad-qualities sit in the body; the mind in haste seizes opportunity. Tukā says: sin and misfortune, even when no proper match-up has happened, come about anyway.
What it means
This is one of Tukārām's quietly devastating diagnostic verses. Laṭikā (the false, the empty) cannot produce chavī (taste) or samvāda (genuine exchange) in speech — words come out, but nothing nourishes between speakers. The dhrūpada then turns away from blame: anyāya tō tyāchā navhē — the fault is not entirely the speaker's. Māyabāpīm vēḷā na sādhilī — the parents did not seize the time. There is a specific period in a child's life when avaguṇa (bad-qualities) can still be shaped, and that window closes. Once closed, anāvara (ungovernable) tendencies own the body, and the mind learns to grab at quickness — tāmtaḍīnēm mana lāhō sādhī — every shortcut, every grasp. The final verse names a Tukārām-specific moral observation: dōṣa āṇi avakaḷā — na paḍatām tāḷa ghaḍē taisē — sin and misfortune fall on people without a corresponding crime, simply because the formation never happened. Cause-and-consequence in moral life can come unstuck.
For someone today
Some people in your life cannot truly converse with you, and pushing harder will not produce taste. Locate the diagnosis honestly: a formation-window closed before they were old enough to notice. This does not excuse harm, but it changes what you expect of repair and where you put your hope. If you are still raising children, the verse hands you a parental sobering: there is a window, and it does close. If you are an adult who knows your own formation was incomplete, the inverse is good news — you can still take charge of the anāvara in yourself; the tāntaḍī (haste-of-the-mind) is the part you can govern from now.
Where this applies
- A relative or colleague whose conversation never lands and whose fault feels diffuse
- Reckoning with one's own ungoverned tendencies and where they came from
- A parenting moment when you can see the window closing
- Cycles of disproportionate consequence in lives where moral formation was thin