The Solitary Anguish
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Tap an underlined Tamil word to explore its sound, meaning, and use.
tāmvīḻvār tamvīḻap peṟṟavar peṟṟārē / kāmattuk kāḻil kaṉi.
Those who are loved by the very people they love are the ones who have got hold of love's fruit with no stone in it.
▸Other translations · Pope (1886) & Aiyar (1916)
“The bliss to be beloved by those they love who gains, / Of love the stoneless, luscious fruit obtains.”
“They alone eat the stoneless all-sweet fruit of love who are beloved of those whom they hold dear.”
Parimelazhagar’s commentary
13th century · public domainParimelazhagar’s own words come first, unaltered. The plain reading follows below.
தாம் வீழ்வார் தம் வீழப் பெற்றவர்= தம்மாற் காதலிக்கப்படும் கணவர் தம்மைக் காதலிக்கப்பெற்ற மகளிர்; பெற்றாரே காமத்துக் காழ் இல் கனி= பெற்றார் அன்றே, காமநுகர்ச்சி என்னும் பரல் இல்லாத கனியை, எ-று.
Source: Tamil Wikisource
Parimelazhagar reads the verse of women whose husbands, whom they love, love them in return. What such women have obtained, he says, is the enjoyment of love as a fruit with no hard grain in it; his word is பரல், grit, rather than a large stone. The comparison is not about sweetness. It is about there being no part of the thing that has to be got past.