Opening Remarks
It is now Savitri’s turn to answer. She answers with great clarity and conviction.
Once my heart has chosen
But Savitri answered from her violent heart,—
Her voice was calm, her face was fixed like steel:
“Once my heart chose and chooses not again.
Even as a human Savitri sets the highest standards for the race. Once she has chosen she does not reverse her choice just because of personal practical considerations. Prompted by her strong heart, calmly but firmly, she refuses to change her choice.
The word I have spoken
The word I have spoken can never be erased,
It is written in the record book of God.
She says firmly that what she has spoken is already written in destiny and cannot now be erased.
The truth once uttered
The truth once uttered, from the earth’s air effaced,
By mind forgotten, sounds immortally
For ever in the memory of Time.
She reveals the secret that a truth that has once been spoken continues to act immortally even when the mind forgets it and the spoken words have been lost to the earth.
Once the dice falls
Once the dice fall thrown by the hand of Fate
In an eternal moment of the gods.
Once the dice is cast in an eternal moment witnessed by the gods, it is bound to move through its full curve of destiny.
My heart has sealed
My heart has sealed its troth to Satyavan:
Its signature adverse Fate cannot efface,
Its seal not Fate nor Death nor Time dissolve.
She says with the full conviction of truth that her heart is now sealed to Satyavan and even adverse Fate cannot efface death or time dissolve.
Grown one being within
Those who shall part who have grown one being within?
Though she is yet not formally married to Satyavan, yet has she inwardly grown one with him through the deep bond of love and hence cannot part.
Death’s grip
Death’s grip can break our bodies, not our souls;
If death take him, I too know how to die.
Death can break the body but not the soul. If Satyavan is to die, she too knows how to walk into the beyond with him.
My immortality
Let Fate do with me what she will or can;
I am stronger than death and greater than my fate;
My love shall outlast the world, doom falls from me
Helpless against my immortality.
She carries within her the inner conviction that she can take on the challenge of death and is stronger than death and greater than fate. She is conscious of her immortality against which death will be helpless.
Fate’s law may change
Fate’s law may change, but not my spirit’s will.”
Fate may change but not her soul’s choice.
An adamant will
An adamant will, she cast her speech like bronze.
With an adamant will, she spoke casting her speech like bronze.
Closing Remarks
Thus Savitri spoke with courage and conviction born of the soul.
