Purananuru - Part 160
So that the coolness may be granted to our scored, twisting, shrunken guts
and to our bodies covered with sweat, baked down and eaten up by our hunger
because no rice has entered them like the drops of rain that come pouring down
with the thunder whose voice makes us quiver with pleasure as they consume
the glowing rays of the fearsome sun and the wilderness where the grass
has been burned dry begins to flourish—to do that for us he will set out small
golden bowls, marked by much use, around the great silver salver! And they will be
like stars circling around a moon that has been all filled up with rice and ghee
and pieces of meat spiced to taste and then he will say, “The families of singers
must never be in need!” and as if it were nothing important to him at all,
he will distribute rare and precious ornaments of gold!
I have been told that if I go to Kumanan, he who rules
the city of Mutiram, where the streets are flowing with strong drink, he who
has the noble reputation of being more of a friend to us singers than he is
to his own friends, he will then be deeply generous to us. This is how people
have spoken of your towering fame! and so I have come here as fast as I could
with my heart urging me on! Since my house is empty of food, and my son who has a sparse
topknot on his head, his stomach turning, seems to have forgotten that his house was
ever there to feed him and he tries many times to suck at an empty breast where
there is no milk and from it he draws nothing! Craving rice and porridge,
he opens the empty jars in the house, one after another, and when he is done with that,
he bursts out crying. When she sees him like this, my wife will tell him
a story, to frighten him, about a ferocious tiger, and in her pain she will try
to distract him by pointing at the moon. She tells him to think about his father
and pretend to be angry with him while she herself goes on grieving
under the full light of day! I ask that she may become rich through your giving me
now, at once! wealth in masses that cannot fade away and be lost. And we will
lavishly sing our praises for your vast fame and we will cause it to rise
up everywhere across the earth surrounded
by the waters of the ocean washing against it with their rolling waves!
and to our bodies covered with sweat, baked down and eaten up by our hunger
because no rice has entered them like the drops of rain that come pouring down
with the thunder whose voice makes us quiver with pleasure as they consume
the glowing rays of the fearsome sun and the wilderness where the grass
has been burned dry begins to flourish—to do that for us he will set out small
golden bowls, marked by much use, around the great silver salver! And they will be
like stars circling around a moon that has been all filled up with rice and ghee
and pieces of meat spiced to taste and then he will say, “The families of singers
must never be in need!” and as if it were nothing important to him at all,
he will distribute rare and precious ornaments of gold!
I have been told that if I go to Kumanan, he who rules
the city of Mutiram, where the streets are flowing with strong drink, he who
has the noble reputation of being more of a friend to us singers than he is
to his own friends, he will then be deeply generous to us. This is how people
have spoken of your towering fame! and so I have come here as fast as I could
with my heart urging me on! Since my house is empty of food, and my son who has a sparse
topknot on his head, his stomach turning, seems to have forgotten that his house was
ever there to feed him and he tries many times to suck at an empty breast where
there is no milk and from it he draws nothing! Craving rice and porridge,
he opens the empty jars in the house, one after another, and when he is done with that,
he bursts out crying. When she sees him like this, my wife will tell him
a story, to frighten him, about a ferocious tiger, and in her pain she will try
to distract him by pointing at the moon. She tells him to think about his father
and pretend to be angry with him while she herself goes on grieving
under the full light of day! I ask that she may become rich through your giving me
now, at once! wealth in masses that cannot fade away and be lost. And we will
lavishly sing our praises for your vast fame and we will cause it to rise
up everywhere across the earth surrounded
by the waters of the ocean washing against it with their rolling waves!
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