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O Padma, my love,
We have met so often!
One day on your lonely bank
At an auspicious twilight hour of autumn
I gave you my heart
It was witnessed by the setting sun.
In that fading afternoon light
You stood like a shy maid
You were so calm, words you had none.
Smiling like a friend the evening star
Was looking at your face.
Since that day Padma, my love,
We have met so often!
To me for various needs come various men
But none of them knows
What bond of love has bound our hearts
They don’t know
In evening hours, to your sandy banks
Why do I come for this rendezvous.
When your noisy swans
Silently sleep in your silent lagoons
When the huts on your eastern bank
One by one shut their doors
None knows then
What tune you hum or what song I sing.
All year round
In autumn, summer, winter and in rainy season
Only two of us have met so often!
Sitting on your banks
So many times I have thought –
If I am born again in some far away land
And sailing on a boat along your wild currents
If I come to this place once more
Passing these villages, their meadows and trees
These sandy beaches, the crumbling banks
Won’t they rekindle in my mind past memories
Lying deeply dormant in my consciousness?
Coming to your lonely banks
Will my heart again overflow
As it did overflow in an earlier life?
In evening hours
Will we meet again on your lonely shores?
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