Verse 17

¹⁷Where those in their sky-cars, with their women, sing the deeds of the master, which wear the world's stain away; and though the scent of the madhavi flowers opening in the water breaks in on their minds with its honey, they cast that wind aside. ¹⁸The clamour of the doves and cuckoos, cranes and ruddy geese, gallinules, swans, parrots, partridges and peacocks falls quiet for a moment only, when the chief of the bees sings out loud, as though singing the story of Hari. ¹⁹Where the mandara and kunda and kuraba, the blue lotus and campaka and arna, the punnaga and naga and bakula, the lotus and the parijata, being flowers of good mind, hold the austerity of the tulasi in high honour, since her fragrance is honoured by her being made his ornament.

²⁰Which is thronged with sky-cars of beryl and emerald and gold, seen only by those who bow at Hari's feet; and the women there, broad at the hip, their faces bright with smiles, stirred no passion in those whose self is Krsna, not by their laughter nor by anything else. ²¹Sri herself, taking form, her lotus feet making their small sound, a lotus in her hand for play, free of fault in the house of Hari, is seen on the crystal wall inlaid with gold, sweeping it as it seems, she whose favour is what everyone else takes such pains for. ²²In the pools with coral banks and stainless water like nectar, in her own garden, attended by her maids, she worships the Lord with tulasi; and looking at her own face there, its curls and its lifted nose, she thinks, dear one, that it is a thing the Bhagavan has tasted and left.