Abhanga 4378
When the infatuation that led you away vanishes in your darkest hour, be honest that you were deceived, and let that honesty be the first step back to clarity.
The verse
पडली घोर रजनी । संगी कोणी नसे चि ॥१॥
पहा हो कैसें चालविलें । पिसें गोवलें लावूनि ॥ध्रु.॥
कोठें लपविलें तें अंग । होता संग दिला तो ॥ ।२॥
मज कधीं नव्हतें ठावें । दोही भावें वाटोळें ॥३॥
तुका म्हणे कैंची उरी । दोहीपरि नाडिलें ॥४॥
Literal translation
Terrible-rajanī-fell — no-one-in-sanga. See-how-walked — pisē-fastened-lured. Where-hid-anga — who-gave-sanga. Never-knew — both-sides-vaṭōḷē. Tukā: what-uri — both-sides-nāḍilēm (fooled).
What it means
A 4-verse continuation of the 4377 woman-alone-in-vana spiritual-allegory. A terrible night has fallen — no one in (my) company. Look how (the path) has been walked — the madness has been fastened-and-lured. Where has that body been hidden — the one who had given the company? I never knew this — on both sides I'm emptied-out. Tukā says: what remnant is there — I'm fooled on both sides. Continues 4377: the soul-feminized abandoned her household-and-companions, entered the wild, got besieged-by-beasts; now night-falls, the one-who-gave-sanga has-disappeared, and-she-realizes-both-sides-she's-been-deceived. Pair with 4377 (woman-alone-in-besieged-vana).
For someone today
This verse continues the story of the woman alone in the forest, and now a terrible night has fallen with no one left beside her. Looking back, she sees how she was led along, how a kind of madness or infatuation pulled her forward step by step. She wonders where the very companion who had promised to stay with her has gone into hiding, because that presence has simply vanished when she needed it most. She admits she never saw it coming, and now feels completely emptied out and deceived from both directions, by the home she left and by the false companionship that lured her. Tukaram's honesty here names a real experience: sometimes the thing that pulls us away from safety turns out to be an illusion that abandons us exactly when the danger is greatest.
मराठी: हा अभंग रानात एकटी पडलेल्या स्त्रीच्या कथेचा पुढचा भाग आहे, आणि आता तिच्यासोबत कोणीही नसताना भयाण रात्र कोसळते. मागे वळून पाहताना तिला दिसते की एका प्रकारच्या वेडाने, मोहाने तिला पावलोपावली पुढे ओढत नेले होते. जो सोबती तिच्यासोबत राहण्याचे वचन देऊन गेला होता तो आता कुठे लपून बसला आहे असा प्रश्न तिला पडतो, कारण गरजेच्या क्षणी तीच उपस्थिती नाहीशी झालेली असते. हे आपल्याला आधीच कळले नाही असे ती कबूल करते, आणि आता दोन्ही बाजूंनी - सोडलेले घर आणि फसवणारी संगत या दोन्हींनी - ती पूर्ण रिकामी आणि फसवली गेल्यासारखी वाटते. तुकारामांचा हा प्रामाणिकपणा एक खरा अनुभव सांगतो: कधीकधी जी गोष्ट आपल्याला सुरक्षिततेपासून दूर ओढते तीच एक भ्रम ठरते, जी संकट सर्वात मोठे असताना नेमकी सोडून जाते.
Where this applies
- When you realize the excitement or infatuation that led you away from safety has quietly disappeared
- When you feel abandoned by exactly the thing or person that promised to stay with you
- When you look back and see how easily you were led astray, step by step, without noticing
- When you feel deceived on both sides, unable to return to what you left and unsupported in what you chased