_Nandini_
Don’t you hear that song in the distance?
_Voice_
What are they singing?
_Nandini_
The autumn song:
_Hark, ’tis Autumn calling:
“Come, O, come away!”--
Her basket is heaped with corn._
Don’t you see the September sun is spreading the glow of the ripening
corn in the air?
_Drunken with the perfumed wine of wind,
the sky seems to sway among the shivering corn,
its sunlight trailing on the fields._
You too come out, King!--out into the fields.
_Voice_
Fields! What could I do there?
_Nandini_
The work there is much simpler than your work in Yaksha Town.
_Voice_
It’s the simple which is impossible for me. A lake cannot run out
dancing, like a frolicsome waterfall. Leave me now, I have no time.
_Nandini_
The day you let me into your storehouse the blocks of gold did not
surprise me,--what amazed me was the immense strength with which you
lifted and arranged them. But can blocks of gold ever answer to the
swinging rhythm of your arms in the same way as fields of corn? Are
you not afraid, King, of handling the dead wealth of the earth?
_Voice_
What is there to fear?
_Nandini_
The living heart of the earth gives itself up in love and life and
beauty, but when you rend its bosom and disturb the dead, you bring
up with your booty the curse of its dark demon, blind and hard,
cruel and envious. Don’t you see everybody here is either angry, or
suspicious, or afraid?
_Voice_
Curse?
_Nandini_
Yes, the curse of grabbing and killing.
_Voice_
But we bring up strength. Does not my strength please you, Nandini?
_Nandini_
Indeed it does. Therefore I ask you, come out into the light, step on
the ground, let the earth be glad.
_Voice_
Do you know, Nandini, you too are half-hidden behind an evasion,--you
mystery of beauty! I want to pluck you out of it, to grasp you within
my closed fist, to handle you, scrutinise you,--or else to break you
to pieces.
_Nandini_
Whatever do you mean?
_Voice_
Why can’t I strain out the tint of your oleanders and build a dream
out of it to keep before my eyes? Those few frail petals guard it and
hinder me. Within you there is the same hindrance, so strong because
so soft. Nandini, will you tell me what you think of me?
_Nandini_
Not now, you have no time. Let me go.
_Voice_
No, no, don’t go. Do tell me what you think of me.
_Nandini_
Have I not told you often enough? I think you are wonderful. Strength
swelling up in your arms, like rolling clouds before a storm,--it
makes my heart dance within me.
_Voice_