Her eye: the hair over it stops the look at the corners, there is no shine of collyrium on it, and it has forgotten how the brow moves, since she gave up wine. When you are near, I suspect, that eye of the doe-eyed one will throb in its upper lid and come to match the beauty of a blue lotus a fish has set trembling.
**The stanza is an omen, and Mallinātha names the book.** तथा च निमित्तनिदाने — and so in the *Nimittanidāna*, a manual of signs — followed by a verse: a quiver in the head foretells a parasol, on the forehead a silk turban, above the eye the getting of what is wished, at the eye's corner a loss. **So *above* is the whole of the prediction**: the same eye quivering a little lower would mean the opposite, and the poem's उपरि is not a detail of the picture but the thing that makes it good news. He then supplies the content — स्वकुशलवार्ताशंसि, announcing tidings of her own good fortune.
**And he supplies which eye, out of a second manual.** वाममिति शेषः, *the left*, with a verse behind it: for women the left side is the fortunate one and for men the right, in giving, in worship, in throbbing, in adornment. The poem says नयनम् and no more. **This is the fourth time the commentary has produced a non-poetic handbook and had the woman turn out to be following it** — the Sāmudrika on her teeth at 2.22, the śāstra on her dirty dress at 2.26, the ten states of love from 2.26 to 2.33, and now two books of omens in four lines.
**What the epithets have in common is that they are all subtractions.** No sidelong look, because the hair is in the way; no collyrium; no play of the brows, because there is no wine. Mallinātha gathers them in one line — नयनस्य रुद्धापाङ्गप्रसरत्वादिकं विरहसमुत्पन्नमिति भावः, all of it comes out of the separation — and then the fourth pāda gives back, in one image, everything the first three took away.
**One word here means the opposite of what it meant one stanza ago.** स्नेह in अञ्जनस्नेहशून्यम् is oil, and Mallinātha glosses it स्नैग्ध्यम्, glossiness; at 2.34 the same word in संभृतस्नेहम् was affection, and he glossed it अनुराग. The two senses are the same word doing what oil does, and the poem sets them two stanzas apart without a comment.
**And the verb of guessing has now gone round three times.** शङ्के here, which Mallinātha glosses तर्कयामि — the same gloss he gave it at 2.28, and तर्कयामि is the word the poet himself used at 2.34, in between. The commentary supplied the poem's next word, the poem used it, and the commentary reached for it again. No figure is named, though the stanza ends on an explicit comparison: तुलाम् एष्यति, *will come to a balance with*, which states a likeness as a transaction rather than showing it.
uncheckedthe reader's reading, following Mallinātha, Sañjīvinī's gloss. His are: the vigraha of रुद्धापाङ्गप्रसरम् with अलकैः supplied into it, स्नैग्ध्यम् and स्निग्धाञ्जनरहितम् for अञ्जनस्नेहशून्यम्, किं च for अपि च, मद्यस्य for मधुनः and निराकरणात् with the Amara line for प्रत्यादेशात्, भ्रूभङ्गः for भ्रूविलासः, विरहसमुत्पन्नमिति भावः, सति and स्वकुशलवार्ताशंसि supplied, the vigraha of उपरिस्पन्दि, the Nimittanidāna verse, वामम् supplied with the verse on the left side, त्वत्सख्याः for मृगाक्ष्याः, मीनचलनात्, सादृश्यम् for तुलाम्, and तर्कयामि for शङ्के. That स्नेह means the opposite here of what it meant at 2.34, that all three epithets are subtractions, that अलक is plural here and singular at 2.31, and that the शङ्के–तर्कयामि gloss has gone round three times, are the reader's; the 2.28 and 2.34 places are checked against `vendor/meghaduta-sanjivini.itx` and `text.md`. The two quoted verses are read for what they are cited to prove and not construed; neither book can be checked, since neither is in this repository“tathā ca nimittanidāne — “spandān mūrdhni chatralābhaṃ lalāṭe paṭṭam aṃśukam | iṣṭaprāptiṃ dṛśor ūrdhvam apāṅge hānim ādiśet””
Her eye: the hair over it stops the look at the corners, there is no shine of collyrium on it, and it has forgotten how the brow moves, since she gave up wine. When you are near, I suspect, that left eye of the doe-eyed one will throb in its upper lid and come to match the beauty of a blue lotus a fish has set trembling. The stanza spends three pādas taking the life out of an eye and the fourth giving it back in a single omen: everything the separation subtracted, the arrival is read as about to restore, and the sign of it is a quiver on the auspicious side, above.
- Mallinātha, Sañjīvinī — 2.35, whole-verse gloss