Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore Quotes

“Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers,
but to be fearless in facing them.

Let me not beg for the stilling of my pain, but
for the heart to conquer it.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Come oh come ye tea-thirsty restless ones -- the kettle boils, bubbles and sings, musically.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“It is the tears of the earth that keep her smiles in bloom.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Man is a born child, his power is the power of growth.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“The night kisses the fading day whispering to his ear, “I am death, your mother. I am to give you fresh birth.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“The Home”

I paced alone on the road across the field while the sunset was hiding its last gold like a miser.
The daylight sank deeper and deeper into the darkness, and the widowed land, whose harvest had been reaped, lay silent.
Suddenly a boy’s shrill voice rose into the sky. He traversed the dark unseen, leaving the track of his song across the hush of the evening.
His village home lay there at the end of the wasteland, beyond the sugar-cane field, hidden among the shadows of the banana and the slender areca palm, the coconut and the dark green jack-fruit trees.
I stopped for a moment in my lonely way under the starlight, and saw spread before me the darkened earth surrounding with her arms countless homes furnished with cradles and beds, mothers’ hearts and evening lamps, and young lives glad with a gladness that knows nothing of its value for the world.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“My Song”
This song of mine will wind its music around you, my child, like the fond arms of love.
This song of mine will touch your forehead like a kiss of blessing.
When you are alone it will sit by your side and whisper ini your ear, when you are in the crowd it will fence you about with aloofness.
My song will sit in the pupils of your eyes, and will carry your sight into the heart of things.
And when my voice is silent in death, my song will speak in your leaving heart.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Things throng and laugh loud in the sky; the sands and dust dance and whirl like children. Man’s mind is aroused by their shouts; his thoughts long to be the playmates of things.
Our dreams, drifting in the stream of the vague, stretch their arms to clutch the earth,--their efforts stiffen into bricks and stones, and thus the city of man is built.
Voices come swarming from the past,--seeking answers from the living moments. Beats of their wings fill the air with tremulous shadows, and sleepless thoughts in our minds leave their nests to take flight across the desert of dimness, in the passionate thirst for forms. They are lampless pilgrims, seeking the shore of light, to find themselves in things. They will be lured into poets’ rhymes, they will be housed in the towers of the town not yet planned, they have their call to arms from the battlefields of the future, they are bidden to join hands in the strifes of peace yet to come.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“The End”
It is time for me to go, mother; I am going.
When in the paling darkness of the lonely dawn you stretch out your arms for your baby in the bed, I shall say, “Baby is not there!”—mother, I am going.
I shall become a delicate draught of air and caress you; and I shall be ripples in the water when you bathe, and kiss you and kiss you again.
In the gusty night when the rain patters on the leaves you will hear my whisper in your bed, and my laughter will flash with the lightning through the open window into your room.
If you lie awake, thinking of your baby till late into the night, I shall sing to you from the stars, “Sleep, mother, sleep.”
On the straying moonbeams I shall steal over your bed, and lie upon your bosom while you sleep.
I shall become a dream, and through the little opening of your eyelids I shall slip into the depths of your sleep; and when you wake up and look round startled, like a twinkling firefly I shall flit out into the darkness.
When, on the great festival of puja, the neighbours’ children come and play about the house, I shall melt into the music of the flute and throb in your heart all day.
Dear auntie will come with puja-presents and will ask, “Where is our baby, sister?” Mother, you will tell her softly, “He is in the pupils of my eyes, he is in my body and in my soul.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“My life when young was like a flower—a flower that loosens a petal or two from her abundance and never feels the loss when the spring breeze comes to beg at her door.

Now at the end of youth my life is like a fruit, having nothing to spare, and waiting to offer herself completely with her full burden of sweetness.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Let thy love play upon my voice and rest on my silence.
Let it pass through my heart into all my movements.
Let thy love like stars shine in the darkness of my sleep and dawn in my awakening.
Let it burn in the flame of my desires
And flow in all currents of my own love.
Let me carry thy love in my life as a harp does its music, and give it back to thee at last with my life.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“When and Why”
When I bring you coloured toys, my child, I understand why there is such a play of coulours on clouds, on water, and why flowers are painted in tints—when I give coloured toys to you, my child.
When I sing to make you dance, I truly know why there is music in leaves, and why waves send their chorus of voices to the ehart of the listening earth—when I sing to make you dance.
When I bring sweet things to your greedy hands, I know why there is honey in the cup of the flower, and why fruits are secretly filled with sweet juice—when I bring sweet things to your greedy hands.
When I kiss your face to make you smile, my darling, I surely understand what pleasure streams from the sky in morning light, and what delight the summer breeze brings to my body—when I kiss you to make you smile.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Lest I should know you too easily, you play with me.
You blind me with flashes of laughter to hide your tears.
I know, I know your art,
You never say the word you would.
Lest I should not prize you, you elude me in a thousand ways.
Lest I should confuse you with the crowd, you stand aside.
I know, I know your art,
You never walk the path you would.

Your claim is more than that of others, that is why you are silent.
With playful carelessness you avoid my gifts.
I know, I know your art,
You never will take what you would.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“I was one among many women busy with the obscure daily tasks of the household.
Why did you single me out and bring me away from the cool shelter of our common life?
Love unexpressed is sacred. It shines like gems in the gloom of the hidden heart. In the light of the curious day it looks pitifully dark.
Ah, you broke through the cover of my heart and dragged by trembling love into the open place, destroying for ever the shady corner where it hid its nest.

The other women are the same as ever.
No one has peeped into their inmost being, and they themselves know not their own secret.
Lightly they smile, and weep, chatter, and work. Daily they go to the temple, light their lamps, and fetch water from the river.

I hoped my love would be saved from the shivering shame of the shelterless, but you turn your face away.
Yes, your path lies open before you, but you have cut off my return, and left me stripped naked before the world with its lidless eyes staring night and day.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Stand before my eyes, and let thy glance touch my songs into a flame.
Stand among thy stars and let me find kindled in their lights my own fir of worship.
The earth is waiting at the world’s wayside;
Stand upon the green mantle she has flung upon thy path; and let me feel in her grass and meadow flowers the spread of my own salutation.
Stand in my lonely evening where my heart watches alone; fill her cup of solitude, and let me feel in me the infinity of thy love.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore

“Let this be my last word, that I trust in thy love.”
― Rabindranath Tagore, Collected Poems and Plays of Rabindranath Tagore