(Rendered
by the Author from his poem in Kannada)
That
You have walked with me without intermission
through-out the journey, I have not realised till
this moment.
Whether
it was because I walked as in a sleep unconscious, or my faculties are dense
and could not perceive, or, again, Your step is so gentle that I could not
notice, or because Illusion lay between us as a veil obstructing vision, I have
not to this moment been aware that You have always walked with me.
Alas,
I thought, I am companionless upon this desert wild, and, turning my grief
over in mind, dissolved in deep distress. I know not the way, I cried, and
there is no one to show it to me. I knew not that You
held me by the hand and were guiding me all the way.
I
turn back and what do I see? On the sand, with the mark of every step I have
made, is the mark of a step of Yours. Over league on
league of inhospitable desert, oh Merciful, You have walked with me step by
step and I knew it not till this moment.
Reprinted from
Triveni, April June, 1942.