The time that my journey lakes is long | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore

The time that my journey lakes is long – is a poem in the Rabindranath Tagore’s poetry collection “Song Offerings” or “Gitanjali” in Bengali. Geetanjali is a remarkable book of verses composed by Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), which earned him the Nobel Prize.

 

It was written originally in Bangla during 1908-1909 and later its English version in prose was published under the title ‘The Song offerings’. It was the first English anthology of Rabindranath published in late 1912 by the India Society of London. On 10 November of the following Year (1913), Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for the book Geetanjali.

This recognition introduced Rabindranath worldwide as an exponent of unique poetic talent. Famous Irish poet W B Yeats wrote the introduction of the English version of Geetanjali. Besides, a pencil sketch of the poet drawn by Rothenstain was published in the book. Rabindranath dedicated Geetanjali to WB Yeats.

Serial Number of the song : 12

 

The time that my journey lakes is long.

THE TIME THAT my journey takes is long and the way of it long.

I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light,

and pursued my voyage through the wildernesses of worlds leaving my track on many a star and planet.

It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,

and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.

The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own,

and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.

My eyes strayed far and wide before I shut them and said ‘Here art thou!’

The question and the cry ‘Oh, where?’ Melt into tears of a thousand streams and deluge the world with the blood of the assurance ‘I am!’

 

 

Read more:

• If the day is done | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore
• Art thou abroad on this stormy night on thy journey | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore
• In the deep shadows of the rainy July | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore
• I must launch out my boat | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore
• On the day when the lotus bloomed alas | Song Offerings, Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore