Shloka 14
Balarāma Visits Vraja: Consoling the Gopīs and Dragging the Yamunā
किं नस्तत्कथया गोप्य: कथा: कथयतापरा: । यात्यस्माभिर्विना कालो यदि तस्य तथैव न: ॥ १४ ॥
kiṁ nas tat-kathayā gopyaḥ kathāḥ kathayatāparāḥ yāty asmābhir vinā kālo yadi tasya tathaiva naḥ
Why speak of Him, dear gopī? Speak of something else. If He can pass His time without us, then we too shall pass our time without Him.
Śrīla Śrīdhara Svāmī points out that the gopīs here subtly indicate that Lord Kṛṣṇa spends His time happily without them whereas they are most unhappy without their Lord. This is the difference between Him and them. Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī adds the following commentary: “Considering themselves different from other women, the gopīs thought as follows: ‘If other women are together with their lovers, they live, and if they are separated, they die. But we neither live nor die. This is the fate Providence has written on our foreheads. What remedy can we find?’”
FAQs
This verse shows the gopīs’ intense viraha: even Kṛṣṇa-kathā feels unbearable when it highlights that time moves on without their direct union with Him; their love is so exclusive that ordinary consolation does not satisfy them.
In the pain of separation, they express a sharp, paradoxical lament—if Kṛṣṇa’s life continues without them, they feel their own life has no sweetness; it reveals the depth of their exclusive devotion rather than literal indifference.
It encourages sincere longing for God and steady remembrance: rather than treating spirituality as casual entertainment, one can cultivate deep engagement with nāma, kīrtana, and śāstra so that the heart truly seeks Kṛṣṇa’s presence.