Rajani

Songs of the Night

Dhan Gopal Mukerji

• Publisher: Mint Editions
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781513223438
• eBook ISBN: 9781513223438
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Asian Poetry
• Index: Literature

Rajani: Songs of the Night (1916) is a poetry collection by Dhan Gopal Mukerji. Published while Mukerji was a young student in California, Rajani: Songs of the Night is the debut collection of poems from the first Indian writer to gain a popular audience in the United States. Lyrical and romantic, Mukerji's poems capture his commitment to beauty while maintaining his sense of isolation and exile as a young man living far from home. In "Bhikshu's Song, " the collection's opening poem, the poet greets a Buddhist monk at the door, returning in memory to his native Bengal. Repeating the Bhikshu's mantra throughout—"Om Moni Padme Om!"—Mukerji allows himself to "drift with the stream / To [his] destination of dream." An exile, Mukerji can only reach his homeland through memory and song, by infusing English meter with the sights and sounds of Bengal. "A singer that sings of sorrow; / Whose night knows no tomorrow; / [His] song finds its source / In its moonless immensity." Although he never returned to his native country, Mukerji left an inspiring legacy through his literary achievement and unwavering commitment to Indian independence. This edition of Dhan Gopal Mukerji's Rajani: Songs of the Night is a classic of Indian American literature reimagined for modern readers.

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Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Bhikshu’s Song
• Song of the Stars
• Rasha Measure
• Tara-Bindu
• Evening Star
• Following the Light
• Her Poet
• To Beauty
• “The Night Builds Her Temple of Rain”
• “The Rain Builds a Bridge”
• The Tower of Silence
• Nisha
• Before the Buddha at Kamakura
• “Why Sad, Like a Crushed Flower”
• “Take These Flowers”
• Love’s Coronation
• To the Sun Shore
• “The Fairies Dance in the Forest of Song”
• “The Honey-Colored Moon”
• A Drama
• “White Mist Wings the Pink-Draped Sky”
• After Reading Yone Noguchi
• “Gold and Rose the Colors Held in the Palette of the Sky”
• “The Mountain Peaks, a Halted Army”
• “Coral-Music, the Sunset Writes on the Scroll of the Sea”
• Lunar Rainbow
• The New Buddha
• “The Sun Waters the Pastures of Heaven”
• Memory of Childhood Days
• “Ah, Sleep-Ravished Eyes”
• “Forbid Me Not”
• “It Is but Coming and Going”
• The Heart of a Song
• Storm Worship
• “To My Heart’s Garden, Stealthily Came He”
• Ernest Dowson
• Sedan Bearer’s Song
• “The Soul of Day Migrates Into the Night”
• The Madman
• “What Dream-Peacock, this Moon”
• “The Sun Sinks Into an Ocean of Mist”
• The Sunset-Images
• The Bells of Moonlight and Leaf
• “Steps of Rose”
• A Contrast
• “The Star-Hands Play the Harp of Night”
• “The Green Hill, a Priest with His Hood of White Mist”
• Intoxicated
• “The Rosy Stream Rolls Down the Hill”
• The Flower-Girl
• Music Within a Mirror
• Love’s Inconsistencies
• “Lave Thy Limbs in the Stream of My Song”
• Flower of Death
• “Eyes, Sad Eyes, What Words They Speak”
• Rose
• “The Moon at the Treetop”
• On a Starry Night
• “The Song-Bird Falls Asleep”
• A Picture
• “One Word the Ships Speak”
• “Silver-Footed Dawn”
• Dance-Worship
• “Sun, Moon and Stars”
• Ploughman’s Song
• “Gone Yesterday’s Rain”
• “The Amber Dusk Veils The Orange-Tinted Sea”
• Coming of Dawn
• “Thy World It Is”
• Birth of Day
• A Note About the Author
• A Note from the Publisher