One request answers every fear: let me truly know You, and I can meet anything unafraid.
The Arc
Pauri 0: the body that feasted on everything returns to the fire — all of it is passing. The Rahao (Pauri 1): Kabir's single prayer — free me from the endless coming-and-going, let me arrive home. Pauri 2: some cremate, some bury; every custom returns the body to the elements. Pauri 3, the close: just let me see You — and then I am unafraid, whenever the end comes.
Key Vocabulary
paanchau amrit: the five delicacies — the body's finest pleasures, here shown as passing
har raa-ay: "O Beloved King" — the intimate, trusting address of the one request
jaarai / gad lay maatee: "some burn, some bury" — different funeral customs, named without ranking
har charan dikhaavhu: "reveal Your feet" — the longing to know the One directly
Themes and Cross-Connections
A memento-mori shabad that resolves into fearlessness through knowing rather than through escape. Pairs with philosophy.md's Naam (what the soul carries when the body is left) and the project's recurring "death befriended" motif (cf. Tilang B00C1582). The evenhanded mention of cremation and burial is a quiet interfaith note.
For Raag Gauree
Gauree's meditative gravity suits a reflection on mortality that ends in calm, not dread.
Translation Notes
WELLBEING (significant): the source's cremation-flames imagery and the garabh (return-to-the-womb) line are softened. "Flames applied to the mouth" rendered plainly as the body returning to the fire, no horror staged; "cast into the womb again" reframed as the gentler "endless coming-and-going, never arriving home." Death-terror consistently answered with fearlessness and homecoming.
INTERFAITH/EVENHANDEDNESS: "some burn it, some bury it" kept and explicitly NOT ranked — presented as different respectful customs (cremation in Hindu/Sikh practice, burial in Muslim/Christian practice), leveling toward the shared truth that the body returns to the elements.
One request answers every fear: let me truly know You, and I can meet anything unafraid.
The Arc
Pauri 0: the body that feasted on everything returns to the fire — all of it is passing. The Rahao (Pauri 1): Kabir's single prayer — free me from the endless coming-and-going, let me arrive home. Pauri 2: some cremate, some bury; every custom returns the body to the elements. Pauri 3, the close: just let me see You — and then I am unafraid, whenever the end comes.
Key Vocabulary
Themes and Cross-Connections
A memento-mori shabad that resolves into fearlessness through knowing rather than through escape. Pairs with philosophy.md's Naam (what the soul carries when the body is left) and the project's recurring "death befriended" motif (cf. Tilang B00C1582). The evenhanded mention of cremation and burial is a quiet interfaith note.
For Raag Gauree
Gauree's meditative gravity suits a reflection on mortality that ends in calm, not dread.
Translation Notes
Last updated: 2026