April blogging #A-Z 2018- G

This post is written for the April blogging #A-Z 2018. 

I have chosen the theme Books and Authors for this year.

G - Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore

 

Gitanjali is a collection of 103 Poems that became popular in the west and also widely translated- the word “geet” means song and “anjali” means offering.  These poems were translated in songs – some of the Christian song books use the songs of Tagore widely, as it has a spiritual significance and beautiful words deep touching the core of our hearts.

One of my favourite authors is Rabindranath Tagore and I remember reading a lot of short stories as a child in school. Kabuliwala was one of my favourite, and there were other stories where I don’t remember the title.

Rabindranath Tagore was born in Calcutta India, wrote poetry, fiction, drama, essay and songs in Bengali, and often translated into English. He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913 the first Asian to receive this prize. In the later part of his age he produced drawings and paintings.

 A few of the poems were also in our high school text book. 

The popular one was in the introductory of all the Text books in school when I studied: The one below was read in our school assembly and sometimes we were asked to recite in the class.

 “Into the hand heaven of freedom my father, let my country awake…”

 Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;

Where knowledge is free;

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;

Where words come out from the depth of truth;

Where tireless striving stretches its arm towards perfection;

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action,

Into the heaven of freedom my Father, let my country awake.

Another favorite poem which was composed and sung by Fr Christopher Coeholo ( A religious Franciscan Priest)  which I sing even now… I wrote this directly from my memory J

“I have come to thee to take thy touch; before I begin my day

Let thine eye  rest upon my eye for a while;

I have come to thee to take thy touch before I begin my day.

Fill my mind with the music to last through the desert of noise.

Let me take to my work thee assurance of thy comradeship my friends

I have come to thee to take thy touch before I begin my day…

“I have come to thee to take thy touch; before I begin my day.

The other popular poems are :

·         Have you not heard his silent steps, He comes, He comes ever comes …

·         Leave these chanting and singing and telling of beads

·         I live in the hope of meeting with him

·         My desires are many and my cry is pitiful

·         My eyes have seen and my ears have heard

·         Give me the strength to bear my joys and sorrow

Here are a few of the recitations of his poem available on the internet. I am glad to find some links here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZwR7JkkMTw

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59S30ct3TIo

Hope you enjoyed the poems of Tagore as much as I did while writing this post. At the end of this post I am inspired to read the other poems too. So I ordered Gitanjali for a personal copy:)

Thank you for reading my post and I wish you  great weekend.

Be Happy!

Be Happy !! Be Blessed!!