In this poem Kabir takes the imagery of a medieval Indian household where the wife, after a few years stay with her husband, is sent by him to her parents' house to spend some time with them. The well-to-do man prepares a comfortable palanquin for his wife, carried by four or five bearers and fitted with a canopy for shade against the strong tropical sun.

The soul, longing to meet the Lord, mourns like the wife who has been sent away to her father's house and is not called back by her husband. The palanquin she rides in is the human body, which is made of tattered rags and suspended from its poles by flimsy threads; that is, the body has nine openings, is subject to disease, and life hangs by a thin thread, for death can come at any moment. The five senses are the bearers who pull the soul in diiferent directions in order to fulfil their cravings. There is no protection against the blazing sun of worldly suffering.

Kabir urges the soul to return to the Lord on the path of love and devotion, a path generally described by Saints as a sword's edge. It might appear difficult to follow because it is not easy to withdraw the mind from worldly pleasures and because it requires one-pointed devotion and complete elimination of one's ego; yet this is the only way for the soul to return to the Lord and attain everlasting union.

My Husband prepared a palanquin
And sent me to my father's house.

The palanquin laughs,
And is laughed at;
It speaks the language of 'I',
Of 'me', 'mine' and 'thine'.

The litter is made of tattered rags,
It is slung with flimsy threads,
And in the gale of cravings
It sways wildly to and fro.

The moods of the five bearers
I fail to comprehend;
They do not listen to one another,
They pull the litter different ways.

The blazing sun is raining fire,
The palanquin is without a shade;
O Beloved! I have suffered,
Suffered much misery
On the way to my father's house.

Says Kabir: Even greater hardship,
Even greater pain, O bride,
You may have to undergo.
Do not lose heart, adore your Lord;
Love Him, love Him, to go back
And be with Him forever.

K.G., p. 90:90
Sāin mere sāj dai ek doli