The Music of Hindostan c8.s3.78

c8.s3.78

if there were no tune to it, I don't know what would be left of the song. But under the spell (mantra) of the tune the mysterious figure of that stranger was evoked in my mind. My heart began to say, "There is a stranger going to and fro in this world of ours; her house is on the further shore of an ocean of mystery. Sometimes she is to be seen in the autumn morning, sometimes in the flowery midnight; sometimes we receive an intimation of her in the depths of our heart, sometimes I hear her voice when I turn my ear to the sky. . . . One day, long afterwards, some one went along the road singing, "How does that unknown bird go to and away from the cage? Could I but catch it, I would put the chain of my mind about its feet!" I saw that that Ba'ul song too said the very same thing. Sometimes the unknown bird comes to the closed cage and speaks a word of the limitless Unknown. Then the mind would keep it for ever, but cannot. What but the tune of a song could report the coming and going of this unknown bird? Because of this I always feel hesitation in publishing a book of songs, for in such a book the main thing is left out. To set forth the music's vehicle and leave out the music itself is just like keeping the mouse and leaving out Ganapati himself.' jā - go, jā - go Ma-ma jau - ba - na ni - kun - je gā - he