Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.81.16
Blended reading (Sanskrit + English inline)
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kva
—
where am I, where is Kṛṣṇa
The classical kva-kva construction expressing immeasurable disproportion. A Sanskrit idiom for incommensurable gaps. Sudāmā's whole stanza is the bhakta's astonished arithmetic of his own unworthiness.
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śrī-niketanaḥ
—
the abode of all opulence
Compound: śrī (opulence, Lakṣmī) + niketana (abode). Kṛṣṇa's defining contrast-term to Sudāmā's daridra. He is where Śrī lives; the brāhmaṇa is where nothing material lives.
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brahma-bandhuḥ
—
a friend of a brāhmaṇa (not fit to be called a brāhmaṇa)
Compound: brahma (brahmaṇa) + bandhu (kin, friend). A self-deprecating term: I am only by relation; the substance of brahminhood is missing in me. Gauḍīya dainya in one word.
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pāpīyān
—
sinful
Comparative of pāpīya (sinful). Sudāmā does not soften his self-assessment. Dainya in Gauḍīya bhakti is not poetic posture; it is the bhakta's actual seeing of himself in Bhagavān's light.
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bāhubhyām parirambhitaḥ
—
embraced by His two arms
Compound: bāhu (arm) + bhyām (dual instrumental) + parirambhitaḥ (embraced). The dual is precise — both arms, not one. Kṛṣṇa held him completely; the kva-kva gap was closed with the full circumference of Bhagavān's embrace.
This translation is from Śrīla Prabhupāda’s English rendering of Caitanya-caritāmṛta ( Madhya 7.143) . Sudāmā was so humble that he considered his poverty to be his own fault, a result of sin. Such a mentality is in accord with the saying, dāridrya-doṣo guṇa-rāśi-nāśī: “The discrepancy of being poor ruins heaps of good qualities.”
Though (iti) I am a fallen brahmana, I was embraced by his arms.
He expands on the previous verse. Am I some special jīva? Is not Kṛṣṇa Svayam Bhagavān? Moreover I am poverty stricken, sinful with no good fortune. But he is the abode of Lakṣmī. By his nature he is full of all wealth. He is full of all śaktis. Just because this person was born in a brāhmaṇa family, he has embraced him with his two arms. That is amazing (sma). He embraced me because I am a brāhmaṇa not because I am a friend. By this he expresses his extreme lack of qualification. He praises the Lord for being affectionate to brāhmaṇas, rather than being affectionate to devotees.
Sudāmā stages two pictures side by side: kva aham — kva kṛṣṇaḥ. A clay lamp and the sun. A sparrow in dust and the king of the universe. Between them, He has extended His two arms. This is the bhakta's classical kva-kva meditation on Bhagavān's inconceivable condescension.
When Akrūra is sent to bring Kṛṣṇa from Vṛndāvana (SB 10.38), he meditates en route on the same disproportion: kva I, the messenger of Kaṁsa; kva He, Bhagavān Himself? The kva-kva idiom is a Bhāgavata signature — the bhakta measures the gap and then watches Kṛṣṇa close it anyway.
Sudāmā calls himself brahma-bandhu — a brāhmaṇa's friend, not a real brāhmaṇa. Prabhupāda translates this as one not fit even to be called a brāhmaṇa. The same epithet will be used by Caitanya Mahāprabhu of Himself when He approaches Sārvabhauma Bhaṭṭācārya in dainya. Gauḍīya dainya does not preen; it actually believes itself low — and that is why Bhagavān raises it.
My note
Source: vedabase.io