A Sea of Foliage Girds our Garden round
A Sea of Foliage Girds our Garden round
Original Text
Dutt, Toru, "Ballads of Hindostan -- Miscellaneous
Poems," intro. Edmund W. Gosse, in Hindu Literature Comprising The Book of
Good Counsels, Nala and Damayanti, Sakoontala, The Ramayana, and Poems of Toru Dutt,
ed. Epiphanius Wilson, rev. edn. (New York: Colonial Press, 1900): 465.
2 But not a sea of dull unvaried green,
3 Sharp contrasts of all colors here are seen;
5Amid the mango clumps of green profound,
6 And palms arise, like pillars gray, between;
8Red-red, and startling like a trumpet's sound.
9But nothing can be lovelier than the ranges
10 Of bamboos to the eastward, when the moon
11Looks through their gaps, and the white lotus changes
12 Into a cup of silver. One might swoon
13 Drunken with beauty then, or gaze and gaze
14 On a primeval Eden, in amaze.
Notes
1] Toru Dutt writes about the family garden house at Baugmaree. Back to Line
4] taraminds: "large tree, Tamarindus indica, N.O. Leguminosæ, supposed to be a native of the E. Indies, but now cultivated in warm climates generally, bearing dark-green pinnate leaves and racemes of fragrant yellow flowers streaked with red" as well as a brown pod-like fruit used in medicine and cooking (OED). Back to Line
7] seemuls: silk-cotton trees with maroon flowers. Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1882
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2001
Rhyme
Form