Her Hymn

Lopāmudrā's own words are kept in the first book of the Ṛgveda, in a short hymn of six verses in which she and Agastya speak to each other, and a disciple speaks at the end. She speaks first.

For many autumns I have toiled, she says, night and day, through dawns that bring old age. Age wears away the beauty of bodies. Let husbands now come to their wives.

Then she speaks of the holy men of old: even they, who kept the truth with the gods, gave up their austerity before they reached its end.

Even those of old who kept the truth, who spoke truths with the gods, even they stopped, for they never reached the end. Let wives now come together with their husbands.

Then Agastya answers her. Not in vain is the toil that the gods protect. Let the two of us win through every contest. Here we two shall win the race of a hundred moves, when we come together as a pair.

He goes on, speaking of himself as the steady one and of her as the restless one.

Desire has come upon me, the desire of a bull held in check, rising from here, from there, from somewhere. Lopāmudrā draws the bull down to her; the restless one draws in the steady one as he breathes hard.

And a disciple closes the hymn, speaking over the soma, the sacred drink pressed and offered to the gods, and praising Agastya's long labour for the children he longed for. I speak close to this soma, drunk within the heart: whatever wrong we have done, let it pardon us. A mortal is full of desires. Agastya, digging with spades, longing for offspring, children and strength, the mighty seer, gained true blessings among the gods.

Two people who have spent long years in austerity together speak plainly here of the body, of age and of love.