Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Asia: Vols. XXI–XXIII. 1876–79. | | | | Introductory to India | | The River Raldivvir | | John G. Wilson |
| | | IN Hindostan runneth a river, | |
| A river that runs from a region | |
| As holy and dread | |
| As Vishnu’s own head; | |
| Its mystical name is Raldivvir, | 5 |
| Raldivvir the Red, | |
| And broad as the ranks of a legion | |
| It flows o’er its bed. | |
| |
| Far back ere the world was yet weary, | |
| While Aryan tribes were still roaming, | 10 |
| No river ran there, | |
| But, arid and bare, | |
| A desolate desert lay dreary, | |
| And burning and dry; | |
| No wild beast that fled with mouth foaming; | 15 |
| Fled there but to die. | |
| |
| A tribe that had wandered and wandered | |
| Far into the desert, were dying | |
| Beneath the fierce sun, | |
| The blinding, fierce sun, | 20 |
| While round them the hot sand-storms thundered. | |
| They died one by one; | |
| The wild sand-storms round them were flying, | |
| Escape there was none. | |
| |
| Then out spake the chieftain Volezert, | 25 |
| The chief of the gray-bearded sages: | |
| “O Vishnu, I pray | |
| Thou lead us the way | |
| From out of this terrible desert, | |
| And lo! I will build | 30 |
| A shrine that shall show through the ages | |
| Thy glory fulfilled.” | |
| |
| He bowed to the ground and he waited, | |
| But all that he heard was the creeping | |
| Of sand in the wind, | 35 |
| Till, choking and blind, | |
| “My children,” he said, “we are fated, | |
| And near is the end.” | |
| Then wild with despair and with weeping | |
| Friend held unto friend. | 40 |
| |
| They cried to their gods, but no answer | |
| Came forth from the darkness, sand-laden, | |
| When swift as a glance, | |
| Erect as a lance, | |
| Up started Raldivvir, the dancer, | 45 |
| A maiden so fair, | |
| So pure and so fair that no maiden | |
| With her could compare. | |
| |
| “O Vishnu, I come to thee, lowly; | |
| No shrine can I build to thy glory, | 50 |
| But now would I die, | |
| That all here may fly | |
| From death, and, O Vishnu the holy, | |
| I call on thy name.” | |
| She ceased, and the sages, the hoary | 55 |
| Old men, flushed with shame. | |
| |
| They gazed at the kneeling Raldivvir, | |
| Then shouted, “Her prayer is availing!” | |
| For leaping to light, | |
| A rivulet bright | 60 |
| Sprang forth and it grew to a river; | |
| It grew all the day. | |
| They builded them boats and went sailing | |
| Away, far away. | |
| |
| And now the tall, swaying pomegranate | 65 |
| Bends low o’er the banks of the river. | |
| The tiger is there, | |
| Crouched low in his lair, | |
| Where swiftly beneath the red planet | |
| The waves run as red | 70 |
| As blood of the maiden Raldivvir, | |
| Raldivvir the dead. | | | | |
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