When the Lord — the individual soul — takes on a body and when he departs from it, he takes these senses along with him, as the wind carries fragrances from their source.

Death and rebirth are here described with a simple, beautiful precision. When the individual soul (called īśvara here — the lord of the body, the inner governor) migrates from one body to another, it takes the senses with it — just as the wind, passing through a garden, carries the fragrance of flowers from one place to another. The wind itself has no fragrance; the flower has no mobility. But together they create the momentary presence of fragrance far from its source. So too, the soul itself is formless and free; the senses are rooted in matter. But in transit, the soul carries the subtle impressions of its senses into the next embodiment — which is why tendencies, memories, and character persist across lives.