Best of Tagore..

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), Nobel prize-winning Bengali poet, author, songwriter, philosopher, artist, and educator wrote “Gitanjali” (1912)

Pluck this little flower and take it, delay not!

I fear lest it droop and drop into the dust.

I may not find a place in thy garland, but honour it with a touch

of pain from thy hand and pluck it.

I fear lest the day end

before I am aware, and the time of offering go by.

Though its colour be not deep and its smell be faint,

use this flower in thy service and pluck it while there is time.

First published in 1910, Tagore’s collection Gitanjali[Song Offerings] of mystical and devotional songs was translated to English in 1912. It would be the first of many volumes that earned him much acclaim in the East and West. It includes an Introduction by fellow Nobel prize-winning poet William Butler Yeats.