According to the Kama Sutra the erotic handbook written two thousand years ago when the wheel of ecstasy is in motion there is no textbook at all and no order. Indian Love Poems is a unique gathering of poems from across more than two and a half millennia that attempts to catalog the disordered ecstasies of love ranging from the Kama Sutra and earlier works up to presentday India and the poets of the Indian diaspora.Emerging from many Indian cultures and eras the poems collected here reflect a variety of erotic and spiritual passions and celebrate the powerful role of desireboth male and femalein the intricate dance of existence. From the twelfthcentury female poet Mahadeviyakka to the twentiethcentury Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore to such contemporary poets as Kamala Das and Vikram Seth this glittering tapestry of lyric voices beautifully and sensually evokes the transfiguring force of love.