It is Your Giving that My Gifts should Honour

to the tune of Ananda-dhara bahiche bhubane by Tagore

(from Gifts: Poems 1992-1999; reprinted in Beauty, Be My Brahman)

It is your giving that my gifts should honour

Giving me my life with all its privileges and with its pain,

for I want no other

It is your giving that my gifts should honour

And the lives of every creature, all those who must endure

Far worse pain than I know; even the cruelty –

And the lives of every creature, all those who must endure

Far worse pain than I know; even the cruelty

Torturing our planet, all is a great wonder –

It is your giving that my gifts should honour

Vast is the world’s becoming, thus what I offer,

In what I write for you, must have grandeur –

Vast is the world’s becoming, thus what I offer,

In what I write for you, must have grandeur,

Tragedy and wit and humour, thoughtfulness and beauty,

Good and Evil both must energise me –

Tragedy and wit and humour, thoughtfulness and beauty,

Good and Evil both must energise me

If I’m to make my talent fit for its giver

It is your giving that my gifts should honour