Читать книгу Seven Hundred Elegant Verses - Govardhana - Страница 29

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.

xlv

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.