The Kural or the Maxims of Tiruvalluvar/Chapter 124
CHAPTER 124
THE WASTING AWAY OF HER LOVELY FORM
SHE
1231. My eyes think on him who left me saying that it was but to increase my happiness that he went, and are ashamed to show their face before flowers.[1]
1232. My lack-lustre eyes that are raining down tears look as if they would betray to others the unkindness of my beloved.
1233. The arms that swelled with joy on the nuptial day now look as if they would proclaim his parting to all the world.
1234. The arms that lost their wonted comeliness at the parting of the beloved, are now grown so thin that their very bracelets slip off from them of themselves.
1235. The arms which have lost their wonted comeliness together with the bracelets that they were wearing, proclaim loudly to the world the cruelty of that cruel one.
1236. I chide my arms for growing lean and allowing the bracelets to fall off, as people now reproach him with cruelty.
1237. Wouldst thou obtain glory, O my Heart ? Then run to the cruel one and tell him of the bruit that hath arisen here from the wasting away of my arm.
HE
1238. As we were embracing each other one day, I but relaxed my arms a little, and the forehead of that artless one grew pale at once !
1239. But a single breath of wind cut its way between us during our embrace, and the blood fled at once from her large eyes that are full even as the rain-cloud.
1240. Did the eyes grow pale only ? They wept also at seeing the pallor of the fair forehead above.
- ↑ For having believed such a palpable absurdity.