The Bangle Sellers by Sarojini Naidu
The poem written by the prominent Indian poet and politician Sarojini Naidu. Here she explores the life of Indian women, the Indian culture and traditions revolving around women. In most of her poems, Sarojini Naidu writes on the theme of Indian culture and people. Her poems are focused on Indian settings and this poem makes no exception. In its Indianness, the poem resembles another poem of hers, In the Bazaars of Hyderabad.
Bangle sellers are we who bear
Our shining loads to the temple fair…
Who will buy these delicate, bright
Rainbow-tinted circles of light?
Lustrous tokens of radiant lives,
For happy daughters and happy wives.
Some are meet for a maiden’s wrist,
Silver and blue as the mountain mist,
Some are flushed like the buds that dream
On the tranquil brow of a woodland stream,
Some are aglow wth the bloom that cleaves
To the limpid glory of new born leaves
Some are like fields of sunlit corn,
Meet for a bride on her bridal morn,
Some, like the flame of her marriage fire,
Or, rich with the hue of her heart’s desire,
Tinkling, luminous, tender, and clear,
Like her bridal laughter and bridal tear.
Some are purple and gold flecked grey
For she who has journeyed through life midway,
Whose hands have cherished, whose love has blest,
And cradled fair sons on her faithful breast,
And serves her household in fruitful pride,
And worships the gods at her husband’s side.
