"Stop describing the beauty of my face. I don't want anything to happen to my face!"
"Why do you say so, Aravalli?"
"Sometime back, you compared my eyes to lotus flowers. The very next day, some external particle got into my eye and I suffered from eye irritation for two days."
"That was an accident. Do you believe that if I praise the beauty of an organ of yours, something will happen to that organ, as a result of my sight falling on that organ?"
"I didn't say that your sight would cause harm to my organs. It might have been a coincidence. But the fact remains that when you praise the beauty of any of my organs, something happens to that organ."
"It is not fair to generalize something, based on one occurrence. The incident about your eye happened a few days back. Why do you mention it now?"
"When something happens repeatedly, should I not mention it?"
"What other thing happened?"
"Two days back, you said that my hip is delicately balanced on a point at the middle part of my body, like a tender creeper that could give in any time."
"Yes, I did. But that is a fact, isn't it? See, how I am able to cover your entire hip with one palm of mine."
"ssss... Don't touch my hip. It is paining already."
"It is paining! Shall I massage it with my palm?"
"No way. I am asking you to not even touch my hip and you want to massage it! What a craving you have!"
"I offered to massage your hip, only with the intention of alleviating your pain. What has happened? Has your hip got sprained?"
"I don't know what caused the pain. Soon after I had my make-up this morning, after taking my bath, my hip began to hurt. My mother applied some oil to soothe the pain. But it had no effect."
"In spite of suffering from the pain, you have come to meet me, your lover Vallabhan. I bow my head before the intensity of your love."
Vallabhan looked at Aravalli, shifting his gaze from her hip to her head.
"Why are you looking at me like this?"
"Why are you looking at me like this?"
"I am trying to ascertain the cause of your hip pain, by studying your appearance."
"The pain is at my hip. But you are looking at my head. I wonder whether you have something called the brain inside your head!"
"It is because I have a sharp brain inside my head that I am able to realize that the cause of your hip pain stems from your head!"
Aravalli threw a look of puzzle at Vallabhan.
"Which flowers are you wearing on your head?" asked Vallabhan.
"Anichcham flowers. Why do you ask this question?... Wait. What are you doing? Why are you removing the flowers from my hair?"
Vallabhan clipped the stems from the flowers he had removed from Aravalli's hair and then tried to put the flowers on her hair again.
"Wait... I don't know how, but after you removed the flowers from my head, the hip pain has disappeared. Don't put the flowers on my head again" said Aravalli.
"The pain will not return. I have clipped the stems, haven't I?"
Vallabhan put the flowers on her hair and told her, "You wore the Anichcham flowers, without clipping their stems. Your hip was strained by the weight of the stems and began to pain."
"Your explanation doesn't appear credible to me, but it is true that the pain has gone now" said Aravalli, smiling.
"Hereafter, I won't praise the tenderness of your hip. Then, you will complain that something has happened to your hip, because of my praising its beauty. I will confine myself to feeling the tenderness of your hip with my hands."
So saying, Valabhan gripped Aravalli's hip with both his palms.
Aravalli didn't try to restrain him.
Thirukkural
Section 3
Section 3
Love
Chapter 112
In Praise of Her Charms
In Praise of Her Charms
anichchappUk kAl kaLaiyAL peydhaL nugappiRku
nalla padA paRai.
Meaning:
She decked herself with Anichcham flowers, without removing the stalks. Her waist was unable to withstand the weight of the stems. No merry drums would be beaten for her waist that was strained.
(This is the English version of the Tamil story 'odivadhu pOl idai irukkum' by the same author.)
Verse 1116 (Soon)
Verse 1114
Verse 1114
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