Sand Castles

The Majestic Lion reclining in the ocean endless,

Who saved from the crocodile’s clutches the elephant maddened and hapless;

With your sideways glances, you trouble our lovelorn hearts,

We, who yearning for you , are already torn apart!

As we work tirelessly, our bangles jingle;

Shaping this labour of love, our sand castle!

O Lord reclining in the ocean with waves of milk,

Do not destroy the castles we so deliberately built!

Another day, another liberal translation from Andal’s Nachiyar Thirumozhi (2.3). 

Kothai and her fellow gopis were building sand castles to offer to worship to the God of love, which Krishna keeps on destroying and goes about effortlessly interfering with their worship.

She then chides Him for doing so, again and again, and tiring them out.

It’s beautiful that this is very similar to the Gopis’ plight in Vrindavan, and on reading about Sant Sakhu Bai, a similar tale repeats there.