Songs from Bhartrhari

Introduction:

A king has come down to posterity and is remembered not for his exploits in arms, the strong imprints of which he has left on the sands of time, but for being a singer of spiritual values, whose songs, no less than three hundred Slokas, usually consisting of four lines, deal with a wide range of subjects, from the love of the Creator and erotic poetry to ethical and moral advice and appeals to renunciation of the world. Classified under three heads they are generally culled under, Srngara, Niti and Vairagya. They are appears from their contents written by him at different periods of his life-from the time when he dwelt in the midst of gaiety and was known as Maharaja Bhartrhari, ruler of the vast kingdom of Ujjain, to the period when with the garments of the barks of trees, he wandered with the name of Siva on his lips in the midst of beautiful scenes drawing his inspiration from the murmuring brooks and the bubbling springs. In these offerings to poesy we have the glimpses of revolt, of sympathy and of mystic raptures.

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