Sarngrava in Love

(SARNGRAVA, Kanva’s disciple, after leaving Sakuntala in the King’s palace at Hastinapuram, meets Priyamvada, the companion of Sakuntala, in the sage’s hermitage).

PRIYAMVADA: Friend Sarngrava, you have not told us yet all that happened at the King’s palace. How is our dear companion, Sakuntala? Have we any special message from her?

SARNGRAVA: Message? Pity, we did not stay there long enough to see the severe storm subside. It shook her to the very roots of her being. How could she muster courage or collect herself to say anything in that state of mind?

PRI:  Ah Sarngrava, what a heart should you possess to leave such an innocent creature alone and unfriended? It is strange too that the sage should have chosen persons like you to accompany her. That’s a matter for greater grief.

SAR: (Laughing) Good Heavens, why this withering scorn and burning anger in your face? Why blame our master? He was indeed careful enough to send along with me and Saradvata, aunt Gautami, just to keep a watch over our youthful impatience or indiscretion. It’s but natural. Why do you still torment yourself with doubts?

PRI: What does aunt Gautami know? Could she ever hope to stand the fire of your impetuosity? Further, aunt Gautami is such a harmless lady. She cannot at all be a measure of safety to act upon you.

SAR: Well then, why did you remain quiet? You could have forewarned our Kulapati of your apprehensions.

PRI: But then, who could anticipate the King to act so heartlessly? Had I the least suspicion of his conduct, I would have prepared myself to safeguard our dear Sakuntala. In the first place, I would not have assented to your escorting her to the palace. Further, in case your going was inevitable, I would have made our Kulapati impart strict instructions to you, regarding how you should acquit yourself towards Sakuntala in the King’s presence, even as you were receiving orders as to how to present yourself to the King.

SAR: Your words but bespeak the lack of circumspection so characteristic of your sex. No wonder then your actions conform to what your dear friend herself has been guilty of.

PRI: (With anger) Sir, stop your sneering words. You may insult me if you should. But please desist from casting any slur on our faultless Sakuntala.

SAR: Ah, what have I said about her which you deem so preposterous? Your lips tremble in agitation. Your face is aglow with indignation. Your arched eye-brows aim their countless missiles at me. Let it be. Just ponder awhile calmly on what I have said. Your dear friend is easily credulous. Not only has she mistaken the fleeting passions of youth of love, but married the King in utter secrecy. If she had felt the slightest misgivings, would she not have sought the counsel of the elders here? How then, do you explain this haste to fall into the bottomless abyss?

PRI: Well, Sir, you presume to know more than the truth. Anasuya and I watched the fast-growing love between Sakuntala and the King. Sakuntala’s love is unique. Could there be any other instance of a lady so losing herself in love at first sight? And what a genuine admiration she cherishes for the King? All the same never once did she show any want of restraint. We two her companions were alone responsible for inducing her to write the love-letter to the King, signifying her intense love. She was able to control herself till then. And have you any idea as to how the King responded? He bore himself with unusual dignity even while in passionate love with her. He hardly approached her without her permission. Alas! Are things so very deceptive in this world! Could the King have forgotten her? No, never. The very gods who brought them together are jealous of their divine love. Sakuntala would not utter a word of marriage herself. Only with our warm approval and constant support did she allow herself to be won over to matrimony by the King.

SAR: Indeed! It is some comfort to learn that with your encouragement and active cooperation Sakuntala allowed herself to be betrayed. Wonderful girls you both are. Till this day I took it entirely to be Sakuntala’s own folly. I am a bit relieved to know that you two were a party to this, her crowning piece of indiscretion.

PRI: Have you no compassion? Do you consider love a mere bundle of desires? You have to do penance all your life before you could know what true love is. Have you ever paused to find out why the sage under whom you take initiation, has not felt once like you about this love? Do you know he did not in the least rebuke Sakuntala for her Gandharva marriage? Have you ever thought of it all? Listen, on the other hand, the sage, as soon as he came to the ashrama and learnt of it, he blessed the event with all his heart. Why do you rave then, heedless of these facts and circumstances?

SAR: True, Priyamvada, absolutely true. It certainly passes my comprehension how the sage could approve of this clandestine marriage. It is still a mystery how this great Rishi, who has controlled his senses should be so indulgent to his daughter in her mad career of love-making. Perhaps, my guru too, has not yet achieved complete mastery over himself. I know his affection for his foster-child is stronger than his feelings towards all the other creatures of the forest. And I do not think anybody else in this affair could satisfy my irrepressible doubts and questionings. But he is after all a human being. He may have a secret satisfaction, in his heart of hearts, that his daughter is to be the consort of a king of the lunar race.

PRI: Well done, Sir. I admire your faith in and loyalty to one whom you venerate as your preceptor. He too deserves congratulations on having a disciple of your stamp. Sir, is this the final outcome of all that you have studied in order to sharpen your intellectual perceptions? Has it come to pass that one like you, in daily attendance on the sage, should suffer doubts to cross your mind regarding your master’s wisdom! Is he like others? If the feeling he evinced towards Sakuntala were a mere weakness, all that he did must be pretence. Just recollect the state of his mind when you returned from Hastinapuram. If he was tolerant to weaknesses of the flesh, he, like us, should have wept over Sakuntala’s fate. But he remained still, with his eyes closed for a while, and then whispered into our ears: ‘Ah, dear ones, why do you grieve? Even the King’s loss of memory may be a blessing in disguise for Sakuntala; for, who knows she may not be destined to a lasting reputation among the women of our race!

SAR: Reputation!...and that for Sakuntala?

PRI: (With growing indignation) Wait, you great one, till I finish my tale.

SAR : Yes, my good lady. And what further tale have you to unfold?

PRI : As the master tried to comfort us, we recollected the curse of the angry Durvasa. For, once, when Sakuntala was immersed in her love-musings, the sage Durvasa came to the hermitage and finding the host’s daughter not ready to receive him, he cursed her to be rejected by the King. Then we both fell at his feet imploring him to pardon her. He relented and did change his curse on our supplication. When our Kulapati heard of these from our lips, he seemed to become more and more clear in his thoughts. Even yesterday, while he was standing near a broken forest-creeper, which had been twisted out of shape in the strong gale of the previous night, he uttered audibly enough for me to follow his meaning. He said: ‘Thank God! the roots are quite safe in the soil. Though the creeper has lost its foliage and is lying on the ground, withered and torn, it will stand up again with the sea-son’s arrival in fresh sprouts; it will again catch with its tender arms the branches of the tall tree by its side and flourish ere long perhaps richer of colour and bloom.’ Even so, thought I, will Sakuntala’s hopes and desires, though crushed for the present be revived. Her faith is strongly rooted in her love; and, when the evil of the curse is worked out, she will regain her lover and live with him in lasting felicity and security. Methought the Kulapati also dreamt of it as I did; his sighs seemed to indicate it.

SAR : Curse? What is it? I have no knowledge of it at all.

PRI: Yes, do you not know that Durvasa’s resentment is acknowledged more famous than your own for its severity? He can reduce anything to ashes in the fire of his anger. That wicked sage would have eternally foredoomed our dear companion to a cheerless life, but for our intercession in time and craving his mercy. He was gracious enough to change the curse and will it otherwise. ‘If any object belonging to the King were to be shown to him, the King’s loss of memory regarding his marriage with Sakuntala will be ended,’ he said, ‘and he will emerge from it even as the bright moonlight regains its wonted splendour when extricated from a mass of dark clouds in the sky.’

SAR: Why did you not previously inform me of this dreadful curse? I could have tried to explain to the King his loss of memory by a narration of it, when Sakuntala was in further distress over the loss of the ring, the only token of remembrance she had with her. Again you have proved the want of circumspection characteristic of your sex.

PRI: Well friend, you cannot understand our plight and so you blame us. But let me assure you, we were not so foolish or so much lacking forethought in what we did. Sakuntala, you must know, was in delicate health. The slightest disturbance to her would have thrown her into unbearable distress. Further, so soft and innocent is her heart. Who will dare sprinkle hot water on a pile of jasmine blooms! Ah, you can never fathom the tenderness of a woman’s heart in love!

SAR: Proceed, Priyamvada.

PRI: That morning when she was about to start for her husband’s home, we felt somehow an urge within to acquaint her of the apprehensions we had. ‘Should the King be in a forgetful mood, kindly do not fail to show him his gift of the ring on your finger,’ we said. You must have then watched the sudden vexation in her startled looks. How could we have the heart to further depress her–a lady whose trepidation even for the forest fawn, frightened by the rumbling clouds, was so real? With what amount of care and tenderness she would protect the bewildered creature, encircling it with her arms! So, we refrained from frightening her further.

SAR: Do you think you acted wisely?

PRI: Why narrate these details to one so callous. You had the hardihood to tell Sakuntala to her face even as she was trembling on the very brink of the gulf yawning at her feet, ‘Foolish one, whither fled thy sense? Without examining his love you yielded to the King. Unequal love has brought on thee this dire catastrophe.’ Your words of contempt are so unjustified that I can easily conclude what total ignorance you have betrayed in matters of love. Perhaps you cannot understand that love’s pangs will make even a strong man pitiably weak.

SAR: I have doubtless heard of it. But I do not consider such men ever to have been strong.

PRI: Indeed! I can follow your import. To love a woman and become a prey to tender thoughts is reprehensible to you. But love can strike unawares even a person armed to the teeth against it. You too will prove no exception to its relentless law. You can understand it only when you are caught up in a love affair with a girl of your own heart.

SAR: Don’t be so sure. Love will be powerless with me, my gentle lady. For it is my intent to remain unmarried even as my great master is. Why not?–Your mischievous smile bespeaks your lack of confidence in my strength.

PRI: Even should you continue life in single blessedness, what guarantee is there that you will be like your great guru? For, never once have I listened to him thinking ill of the other sex as you do. Moreover, he has understood, as none else has, the freedom which our sex has a right to enjoy. To prove his high opinion of women, nothing more need be pointed out than the way he treated his daughter and brought her up. But for that freedom, how could she have moved in such intimate relationship with everyone in the hermitage, from the tree and bush in the forest to the inhabitants, young and old, of the sage’s household? Can’t you now recollect how on the day she was preparing to depart from these woods, every creature here, the deer and the peacock, the tree and the creeper, the wise sage as well as the aged matron in the hermitage, wept for her? What else is it but the freedom she enjoyed so well that has been responsible for all the wonderful things that happened here to extort our admiration and love for her! Your master aptly described the choice of her life as only comparable to the navamallika creeper entwining itself round the kesara tree.

SAR: It is all poetic.

PRI: Well Sir, it is a pity after all these long years of your studentship under our Kulapati, you should show such colossal ignorance of the purity of his soul, the rectitude of his conduct and the utter magnanimity of his heart. But it’s never too late. Do not waste the remaining short period of your studentship in turning over the pages of worn-out tomes. Lend your observation to the remarkable gifts of your master’s spirit. May you thus raise your own stature and quality! But I shall not waste further time here in mere exhortations. Let me take leave of you, Sir.

SAR: (In astonishment) Please tarry awhile, my good lady. Your indignation is a source of food for my thoughts. You are not what you seem to be, a maiden in her teens and inexperienced of life. The sparks that your intellect emits envelop me. The depth of your understanding ridicules my book-fed knowledge. Your winged words illumine everything and offer me an opportunity to change my hitherto firm convictions about your sex.

PRI: What is this change I notice in you? I am highly amused at your blabberings. Friend, is it you who speak of regard for women? Some confusion there must be in your brain that makes you say things unbelievable.

SAR: Priyamvada! What a false name you have been given! Still your words, however harsh, draw me to you. I take it your lips can utter only sweet counsel.

PRI: Sir, you are really strange today. To take me to be gentle or sweet to you, either you should be off your head or you should pretend to be impressed with me for ulterior purposes.

SAR: Yes, you are right. If you ask me for the reasons I may be at a loss to explain. But one thing I am sure of. I’ll never rank you with the rest of your kind. Your keen intellectual powers and understanding will easily put men to shame.

PRI: Hermit, am I to believe my own ears? I am not surprised at what you had talked so far. Only just now you pour out words that are devoid of any sense to me. But pray, permit me to go my way. Enough of this conversation with you.

SAR: After inducing in me strong feelings, you try to stifle them in a moment.

PRI: Feelings! What are you talking of, friend? Have you shed your former habits? Should any of us chance to be sighted anywhere near these spots, you used to hiss with your stern rebuke: ‘What business have you near the students’ quarters?’ Why do you, I ask you, Sir, now linger about the same place with me all alone? Please leave me at once, lest someone should observe your unusual behaviour and remark about it. You may perhaps run the risk of scandal-mongering from your own good friends here.

SAR: True, they were my former habits. Those were words spoken by me before the vision dawned upon me. Hereafter your conversation will be to me an education in itself.

PRI: Well, am I then to understand all that you spoke to Sakuntala was previous to this wisdom dawning upon you? Are you prepared to own your mistake?

SAR: Priyamvada! Why do you punish me so? I merely carried out the behests of my master. What else council I have done in the situation?

PRI: Again you revert to the same old theory. Can you assert, Sir, that the Kulapati wanted you to say to her those cruel words which you blurted out in anger to that innocent lady when she tried to return with you to the forest?

SAR: Don’t you understand that the course I adopted was the only one sanctioned by our law-givers? If the husband abandons his married wife, it is her duty to remain in his household and do all the work, however low it be. Are we to break away from the path our forbears have marked for us?

PRI: I have a heart to despise your books. But what use in condemning books, when they that use them have not profited by them? Leave alone the books. Have you no gentle words to communicate the injunctions of your scriptures? Have you no other method of admonition? Where did you get the healthy notion that because a husband has abandoned his wife, her nearest relations also should forsake her? Pray, give me an idea as to which text in your Sastras carries this injunction. Whatever be the reason, could you not entertain even a fair thought of consoling a girl in distress? How Sakuntala bore the tribulations, God only knows. Oh lord! You have created only men learned and astute of brain, but with not an iota of sympathy in their hearts for the suffering and the unfortunate!

SAR: Ah, what enduring friendship binds you to your dear companion, I can realise only now. Unable to bear the wickedness of the King, I scolded her, just as a mother would beat her own dear child when it falls on the ground willfully and hurts its limbs.

PRI: But no true mother will do like that. A good mother would at once try to soothe the child’s pain. Unnatural mothers alone behave in the fashion you have pointed out.

SAR: (With anguish) When I reflect upon the past events, my mind is not the same today. You can expect anyone in my position to have acted unhinged. Am I old enough for all that? Why blame me without taking all the circumstances?

PRI: At least now your eyes have opened. I am happy over it. But don’t imagine age alone confers on men maturity of outlook. Correct education and experience can aid one, even in youthful years, with fine perceptions. Don’t you know that many of our high-class intellectuals have shown wonderful insight even while young and strong? There is no rule that age alone tones up an individual’s imagination.

SAR: Priyamvada, you will not budge even an inch in your arguments. My wonder at your extraordinary powers knows no bounds. Say, you will pardon me for what I did.

PRI: Pardon? From me? And for what?

SAR: What else do you expect of me? I am quite prepared to do everything you demand. Only spare my feelings by not harping upon my soulless act.

PRI: I cannot believe myself to find you so very considerate. But is it enough if I am not prepared to call you a learned fool? Should not the whole world be ready to excuse you and your unjust behaviour to Sakuntala?

SAR: Let the world think anything it likes of me. I beg only for your sense of fairness and kindliness to me.

PRI: Why this sudden great regard for me? Do the same lips that once uttered harsh words, now speak so softly to me ?

SAR: It is a fact I had no concern for the rest of the world, when as a student I had nothing but books and my studies to care for. That has not done me much good either. In my zest for studying the Sastras, I have forfeited even the bit of commonsense nature gave me. At least let me save myself in the days to come. Your eloquence has lighted the path before me and dissolved the darkness that covered everything around me before. Only one remembrance will ever be a thorn in my memory. My career as a student is nearing its close. But when I pass out from here as a full-fledged scholar, book-fed lessons with no experience of life to support, them will dog me into the world. Nor can I hope to live here any longer, for I am equally afraid to seek further shelter under my master’s roof. For I may harm myself hereafter if I continue living here.

PRI: Why all this emotion? When the cream has to form on the top; why break the pot?

SAR: Ah lady, why do you mercilessly aim the arrows of your resentment against poor me? The wound is sore, being prodded with the sharp needle of your wits again and again. Perhaps you are not informed of my early beginnings. While yet an orphan child, a kind kinsman of mine brought me here to the forests. And my eyes from the beginning learnt only to peer into the leaves of books shutting out from them nature’s inexhaustible beauty and riches. My master treated me with great kindness. My faultless education instilled in me only a sense of unbending pride in my equipment and learning. If I am to lay at the feet of my master my fees for initiating me into the secrets of knowledge, I can only place my head bowed in defeat and shame as the proper offering I could think of.

PRI: Friend, your indignation is more becoming you and your manliness. Please do not grieve over things past redemption. When I complained of you to the Kulapati, do you know how he met my charges? He said: ‘Why blame poor Sarngrava always? None is really to blame for Sakuntala’s misfortunes. She has to go through what has been ordained for her. Hence have no doubts as regards your master’s readiness to forgive you and render all possible help to you while in need.

SAR: If he should also leave me forlorn where else could I look for support in my miserable days?

PRI: I am quite at a loss to know what exactly worries you, or what you actually hide in the impregnable fortress of your heart.

SAR: You can easily divine it. No, no. I cannot speak it out. You may even drop these conversations you occasionally have with me. I can never thereafter spend with peace a day more here in this hermitage.

PRI: Why do you hesitate to speak out? Has your deep erudition of the Upanishads only instilled such cowardice in your heart? It cannot be anything but a sense of profound attachment for something here that is responsible for so much want of courage in you.

SAR: Yes, I know the Upanishadic texts leave me cold just when they are most needed to warm me up. The ring that slipped from Sakuatala’s finger may be even recovered, but not for me a good opportunity that has been lost. I deplore that I spoke so very unguardedly to Sakuntala, and earned everlasting contempt from one so worthy as you.

PRI: Sir, please have no regrets. I have never harboured any ill-feeling towards you. I only disliked your erudition divorced of experience of life. When I see you repentant, I even get over that dislike. But tell me what exactly pains your heart. I’ll not leave this place without knowing it from your own lips.

SAR: Alas, Priyamvada, do not persist so. The moment you know it, you will abandon me, I am sure. No, no, I won’t say.

PRI: (Pausing) Whatever I had said before was born out of my deep attachment for my dear Sakuntala. I swear, I bear you no grudge. Perhaps my playfulness and sharp retorts have offended you much. If so, I beg you, forgive me.

SAR: Are you still unable to decipher my thoughts? Yes, I’ll speak out then....If only a woman of your character were to partner me in life. Alas, my life has been a wasteful desert!

PRI: (Stupefied) What is this?...Is it Sarngrava that speaks thus?

SAR: No. It is not Sarngrava that speaks. It is his ineffable love that speaks.

PRI: To hear you speak of your love surprises me more than the King’s losing his memory of his love for Sakuntala.

SAR: Surprise! Is that the word? Then I am saved! I am glad it has stopped with surprise. I feared I would receive worse recrimination in return for my confession.

PRI: I am really confounded. I shall not tarry here any more.

SAR: But can it be just of your gentler sex to leave me in this state of mind and go?

PRI: What strange words! I am in a dilemma. Sir, it is not proper that you should address me thus when I am alone.

SAR: Love wants only such privacy to pour out its longings. Love’s warmth increases only in secrecy and in silence. If only you could give me a word of assurance, even now I’ll run to my master and seek his blessings for its consummation. Well can you be Priyamvada, sweet-tongued-to everybody, but not to me?

PRI: Sir, I must have time to search my heart. You have made your hasty proposal to me. You have said already that love that is discovered in haste is doomed to die. No, go to your own quarters today. I must confer with my companion Anasuya...Further, this may be but an evanescent feeling.

SAR: I deserve this and even more...I know I must put up with every kind of humiliation you may heap on me...But if at the end of it all, you are prepared to say the one word I want—

PRI: One word! Why this frugality of words? I have never been parsimonious of language. But you seek by your own conduct to deprive me of my natural flow of words.

SAR: Alas, you murder me alive. Let us tell the Kulapati. He is sure to approve of our marriage. Why do you look so? Do you think our Kulapati will not agree to it?

PRI: Are you so very timid? Alas, I am deceived by your talk. Or, it is blind love that drains you of your strength.

SAR: I am no brave man. I own I am a coward. Whatever I am, if you will but choose me in the end, it is enough.

PRI: Have I not the right, Sir, to decide what sort of man he should be who wishes to win my hand?

SAR: I am sorry, Priyamvada, it is my talk that spoils everything. I’ll be dumb from now on. Kindly throw me your sweet glances. I shall be grateful to you for such little mercies.

PRI: Taken that I agree to marry you what assurance will you give me in order that you will not regret it afterwards?

SAR: I am prepared to do anything you ask of me. I am ready to give up my very life.

PRI: Then how can you marry me? Please do not rush on breathlessly; I see, if men go mad with love, they will perpetrate worse things in the name of love than women ever will dare to do.

SAR: (Laughing) You won’t allow me to proceed in anything.

PRI: But you can proceed your way, Sir, leaving me to myself. But before that I have a question to ask of you.

SAR: Ask me anything, I’ll answer.

PRI: I will accede to your wishes provided you will first obtain my dearest Sakuntala’s approval for our marriage.

SAR: Sakuntala’s approval to be sought? Quite proper...It is just the punishment I should receive for having insulted her. Still she will not stand in our way. Has she not shown wonderful magnanimity in excusing even the husband who rejected her and throwing all the blame on her own fate?

PRI: (With tears in her eyes) What a noble lady! When shall I see my mistress restored to her happiness in life? Well, Sir, should we marry and be gay while Sakuntala is in distress?

SAR: Oh, wonderful friendship that is yours! I know, my love, Sakuntala will be soon reclaimed by the King. Even if she is not soon restored to her dear lord, till she again decorates her braided hair with flowers and paints her eye-lashes with collyrium, we shall not wed. But we will wait as lovers, making due penances to obtain each other.

PRI: Sarngrava, may your love increase in intensity! If love can be the fruit of hard penances, it has no parallel. While you do penance to attain me, I shall also be thinking of you and you alone. Those who know of Sakuntala’s true love, will also know of the love we bore each other and how We had to wait for its consummation. They will be the fortunate ones who know of it.

SAR: No, not they; I am the fortunate one.