کبیرا Kabira — Kabir

What selfishness is yours: you choose neither the sun nor the shade. What selfishness is yours: your feet settle nowhere. You made yourself a prophet, you crossed the seven seas, and still the mind stayed dry inside. Why did it stay that way?

The passage is the charge sheet, and the charge is the refusal to choose. Dhoop and chhaan, sun and shade, are the two options the runner will not take, and the feet that settle nowhere are the selfishness's proof. The second couplet raises the scale: the man has made himself a prophet and crossed the seven seas, and the mind stayed sukha, dry. The dryness is the passage's finding, and the question, kyun rah gaya, why did it stay, is the question the whole song exists to answer.

خودغرضی khudgarzi

selfishness

ٹھور thor

a resting place, a spot to settle in

پیغمبر paigambar

a prophet, one who carries a message

Listen, Kabir, accept it. Listen, faqir, accept it. Come, your own shadows are calling you. Listen, Kabir, accept it. Listen, faqir, accept it. What an unloving one you are, what a deserter.

The refrain is the scolding, and the scolding has the tradition's two titles in it: Kabira, the saint, and faqir, the beggar of God. Maan ja, accept it, is the imperative of surrender, and the call comes from the shadows, parchhaaiyaan, which are the beloved and the self at once. The last line names the two crimes, nirmohi, without love, and harjaiya, the deserter, and the two words are the whole indictment.

فقیر faqir

a mendicant, one who owns nothing by choice

نرموہی nirmohi

one without attachment or affection

ہرجائی harjaiya

one who belongs everywhere and to nobody

The same broken charpai. The cool east wind watches the road. The same sweet cream of the vendors. The clay water-pot watches the road. What selfishness is yours: neither salt, nor God, nor sugar on the lips. What selfishness is yours: the old love is forgotten by you.

The passage is the inventory of home, and every object is given the same verb, rasta dekhe, watches the road. The broken charpai, the cool wind, the vendor's cream, the clay pot: the home is a row of watchers, and the watchers are the evidence of what was left. The passage's second half is the diagnosis, laab namak raam na misri, neither salt, nor Ram, nor sugar, the three tastes of the mouth reduced to nothing, and the last line names the crime: preet puraani bisri, the old love has been forgotten. The forgetting is the selfishness.

چارپائی charpaai

a woven rope cot

پروائی puravai

the east wind

صراحی suraahi

a long-necked clay pot for water

مصری misri

rock sugar

Ecstatic master, ecstatic wanderer: you are a whirlwind of air. You went out, like that, inside and inside. Why did it stay that way?

The passage is the verdict, and the verdict is a picture. The man is given the tradition's highest titles, mast maula, mast qalandar, the ecstatic ones, and then reduced to his element: a whirlwind of air, all motion and no weight. The last lines are the passage's finding, bujh ke yun andar hi andar, he went out, inside and inside, like a lamp with no air, and the question returns, kyun rah gaya. The burning out from within is the song's final diagnosis of the runner, and the refrain's answer, maan ja, is the only medicine.

مست مولا mast maula

one lost in ecstasy and answerable to nobody

قلندر qalandar

a wandering dervish who has given up everything

بونڈر bavandar

a whirlwind