The Solitary Anguish
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uṟāark kuṟunō yuraippāy kaṭalaic / ceṟāay vāḻiya neñcu.
You would tell your great trouble to a man who is nothing to you? Go and fill up the sea instead. Long life to you, my heart.
▸Other translations · Pope (1886) & Aiyar (1916)
“Tell him thy pain that loves not thee? / Farewell, my soul, fill up the sea!”
“Bless thee, my Heart! Thou wouldst tell thy grief to one who loveth thee not: thou mayest as well try to dry up the sea.”
Parimelazhagar’s commentary
13th century · public domainParimelazhagar’s own words come first, unaltered. The plain reading follows below.
உறாஅர்க்கு உறுநோய் உரைப்பாய் நெஞ்சு= நின்னொடு உறாதார்க்கு நின்னுறுநோயை உரைக்கலுற்ற நெஞ்சே; கடலைச் செறாய்= நீ ஆற்றாய் ஆயினும் அரிதாய அதனையொழிந்து, நினக்குத் துயரம்செய்கின்ற கடலைத் தூர்க்க முயல்வாயாக, அஃது எளிது, எ-று.
Source: Tamil Wikisource
Parimelazhagar reads this as the woman speaking to her own heart — the heart that has set out to tell its suffering to someone who has no tie to her at all. He grants that she cannot bear the pain, and that much is true. But leave off that impossible business, he explains, and go instead to the sea that torments you and try to fill it in. The edge of the couplet is in the three words he ends on: அஃது எளிது, 'that is the easy one'. If filling in the sea is the easier of the two tasks, the other needs no measuring.