{"id":1017,"date":"2013-07-13T01:32:02","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1017"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:32:02","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:02","slug":"26-book-12-epilogue-vol-29-savitri-volume-29","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/29-savitri-volume-29\/26-book-12-epilogue-vol-29-savitri-volume-29","title":{"rendered":"-26_Book 12 Epilogue.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\tBook Twelve<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nEpilogue<\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n\n
\n

 Epilogue<\/i> <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe Return to
\nEarth<\/font><\/span> <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Out of abysmal trance her spirit woke.<\/p>\n

Lain on the earth-mother’s calm inconscient breast<\/p>\n

She saw the green-clad branches lean above<\/p>\n

Guarding her sleep with their enchanted life,<\/p>\n

And overhead a blue-winged ecstasy<\/p>\n

Fluttered from bough to bough with high-pitched call.<\/p>\n

Into the magic secrecy of the woods<\/p>\n

Peering through an emerald lattice-window of leaves,<\/p>\n

In indolent skies reclined, the thinning day<\/p>\n

Turned to its slow fall into evening’s peace.<\/p>\n

She pressed the living body of Satyavan:<\/p>\n

On her body’s wordless joy to be and breathe<\/p>\n

She bore the blissful burden of his head<\/p>\n

Between her breasts’ warm labour of delight,<\/p>\n

The waking gladness of her members felt<\/p>\n

The weight of heaven in his limbs, a touch<\/p>\n

Summing the whole felicity of things,<\/p>\n

And all her life was conscious of his life<\/p>\n

And all her being rejoiced enfolding his.<\/p>\n

The immense remoteness of her trance had passed;<\/p>\n

Human she was once more, earth’s Savitri,<\/p>\n

Yet felt in her illimitable change.<\/p>\n

A power dwelt in her soul too great for earth,<\/p>\n

A bliss lived in her
\nheart too large for heaven.<\/p>\n

Light too intense for thought and love too boundless<\/p>\n

For earth’s emotions lit her skies of mind<\/p>\n

And spread through her deep and happy seas of soul.<\/p>\n

All that is sacred in the world drew near<\/p>\n

To her divine passivity of mood.<\/p>\n

A marvellous<\/span> voice of silence
\nbreathed its thoughts.<\/p>\n

All things in Time and Space she had taken for hers; <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 715<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

In her they moved, by her they lived and were,<\/p>\n

The whole wide world clung to her for delight,<\/p>\n

Created for her rapt embrace of love.<\/p>\n

Now in her spaceless<\/span> self released
\nfrom bounds<\/p>\n

Unnumbered years seemed moments long drawn out,<\/p>\n

The brilliant time-flakes of eternity.<\/p>\n

Outwingings<\/span> of a bird from its
\nbright home,<\/p>\n

Her earthly morns were radiant flights of joy.<\/p>\n

Boundless she was, a form of infinity.<\/p>\n

Absorbed no longer by the moment’s beat<\/p>\n

Her spirit the unending future felt<\/p>\n

And lived with all the unbeginning<\/span>
\npast.<\/p>\n

Her life was a dawn’s victorious opening,<\/p>\n

The past and unborn days had joined their dreams,<\/p>\n

Old vanished eves and far arriving noons<\/span><\/p>\n

Hinted to her a vision of prescient hours.<\/p>\n

Supine in musing bliss she lay awhile<\/p>\n

Given to the wonder of a waking trance;<\/p>\n

Half-risen then she sent her gaze around,<\/p>\n

As if to recover old sweet trivial threads,<\/p>\n

Old happy thoughts, small treasured memories,<\/p>\n

And weave them into one immortal day.<\/p>\n

Ever she held on the paradise of her breast<\/p>\n

Her lover charmed into a fathomless sleep,<\/p>\n

Lain like an infant spirit unaware<\/p>\n

Lulled on the verge of two consenting worlds.<\/p>\n

But soon she leaned down over her loved to call<\/p>\n

His mind back to her with her travelling<\/span>
\ntouch<\/p>\n

On his closed eyelids; settled was her still look<\/p>\n

Of strong delight, not yearning now, but large<\/p>\n

With limitless joy or sovereign last content,<\/p>\n

Pure, passionate with the passion of the gods.<\/p>\n

Desire stirred not its wings; for all was made<\/p>\n

An overarching of celestial rays<\/p>\n

Like the absorbed control of sky on plain,<\/p>\n

Heaven’s leaning down to embrace from all sides earth, <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 716<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

A quiet rapture, a vast security.<\/p>\n

Then sighing to her touch the soft-winged sleep<\/p>\n

Rose hovering from his flower-like lids and flew<\/p>\n

Murmurous<\/span> away. Awake, he found
\nher eyes<\/p>\n

Waiting for his, and felt her hands, and saw<\/p>\n

The earth his home given back to him once more<\/p>\n

And her made his again, his passion’s all.<\/p>\n

With his arms’ encircling hold around her locked,<\/p>\n

A living knot to make possession close,<\/p>\n

He murmured with hesitating lips her name,<\/p>\n

And vaguely recollecting wonder cried,<\/p>\n

\u201cWhence hast thou brought me captive back, love-chained,<\/p>\n

To thee and sunlight’s walls, O golden beam<\/p>\n

And casket of all sweetness, Savitri,<\/p>\n

Godhead and woman, moonlight of my soul?<\/p>\n

For surely I have travelled<\/span> in
\nstrange worlds<\/p>\n

By thee companioned, a pursuing spirit,<\/p>\n

Together we have
\ndisdained the gates of night;<\/p>\n

I have turned away from the celestial’s joy<\/p>\n

And heaven’s insufficient without thee.<\/p>\n

Where now has passed that formidable Shape<\/p>\n

Which rose against us, the Spirit of the Void,<\/p>\n

Claiming the world for Death and Nothingness,<\/p>\n

Denying God and Soul? Or was all a dream<\/p>\n

Or a vision seen in a spiritual sleep,<\/p>\n

A symbol of the oppositions of Time<\/p>\n

Or a mind-lit beacon of significance<\/p>\n

In some stress of darkness lighting on the Way<\/p>\n

Or guiding a swimmer through the straits of Death,<\/p>\n

Or finding with the succour<\/span> of its
\nray<\/p>\n

In a gully mid the crowded streets of Chance<\/p>\n

The soul that into the world-adventure came,<\/p>\n

A scout and voyager from Eternity?\u201d<\/p>\n

But she replied, \u201cOur parting was the dream;<\/p>\n

We are together, we live, O Satyavan.<\/p>\n

Look round thee and behold, glad and unchanged <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 717<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Our home, this forest, with its thousand cries<\/p>\n

And the whisper of the wind among the leaves<\/p>\n

And, through rifts in emerald scene, the evening sky,<\/p>\n

God’s canopy of blue sheltering our lives,<\/p>\n

And the birds crying for heart’s happiness,<\/p>\n

Winged poets of our solitary reign,<\/p>\n

Our friends on earth where we are king and queen.<\/p>\n

Only our souls have
\nleft Death’s night behind<\/p>\n

Changed by a mighty dream’s reality,<\/p>\n

Illumined by the light of symbol worlds<\/p>\n

And the stupendous summit self of things,<\/p>\n

And stood at Godhead’s gates limitless, free.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then filled with the glory of their happiness<\/p>\n

They rose and with safe clinging fingers locked<\/p>\n

Hung on each other in a silent look.<\/p>\n

But he with a new wonder in his heart<\/p>\n

And a new flame of worship in his eyes:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat high change is in thee, O Savitri? Bright<\/p>\n

Ever thou wast<\/span>, a goddess still
\nand pure,<\/p>\n

Yet dearer to me by thy sweet human parts<\/p>\n

Earth gave thee making thee yet more divine.<\/p>\n

My adoration mastered, my desire<\/p>\n

Bent down to make its subject, my daring clasped,<\/p>\n

Claiming by body and soul my life’s estate,<\/p>\n

Rapture’s possession, love’s sweet property,<\/p>\n

A statue of silence in my templed<\/span>
\nspirit,<\/p>\n

A yearning godhead and a golden bride.<\/p>\n

But now thou seemst<\/span> almost too
\nhigh and great<\/p>\n

For mortal worship; Time lies below thy feet<\/p>\n

And the whole world seems only a part of thee,<\/p>\n

Thy presence the hushed heaven I inhabit,<\/p>\n

And thou lookst<\/span> on me in the gaze
\nof the stars,<\/p>\n

Yet art the earthly keeper of my soul,<\/p>\n

My life a whisper of thy dreaming thoughts,<\/p>\n

My morns a gleaming of thy spirit’s wings,<\/p>\n

And day and night are of thy beauty part. <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 718<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Hast thou not taken my heart to treasure it<\/p>\n

In the secure environment of thy breast?<\/p>\n

Awakened from the silence and the sleep,<\/p>\n

I have consented for thy sake to be.<\/p>\n

By thee I have greatened my mortal arc of life,<\/p>\n

But now far heaven’s unmapped infinitudes<\/p>\n

Thou hast brought me
\nthy illimitable gift.<\/p>\n

If to fill these thou lift thy sacred flight,<\/p>\n

My human earth will
\nstill demand thy bliss:<\/p>\n

Make still my life through thee a song of joy<\/p>\n

And all my silence wide and deep with thee.\u201d<\/p>\n

A heavenly queen consenting to his will,<\/p>\n

She clasped his feet, by her enshrining hair<\/p>\n

Enveloped in a velvet cloak of love,<\/p>\n

And answered softly like a murmuring lute:<\/p>\n

\u201cAll now is changed, yet all is still the same.<\/p>\n

Lo, we have looked upon the face of God,<\/p>\n

Our life has opened with divinity.<\/p>\n

We have borne identity with the Supreme<\/p>\n

And known his meaning in our mortal lives.<\/p>\n

Our love has grown greater by that mighty touch<\/p>\n

And learnt its heavenly significance,<\/p>\n

Yet nothing is lost of mortal love’s delight.<\/p>\n

Heaven’s touch fulfils but cancels not our earth:<\/p>\n

Our bodies need each other in the same last;<\/p>\n

Still in our breasts repeat heavenly secret rhythm<\/p>\n

Our human heart-beats passionately close.<\/p>\n

Still am I she who came to thee mid the murmur<\/p>\n

Of sunlit leaves upon this forest verge;<\/p>\n

I am the Madran<\/span>, I am Savitri.<\/p>\n

All that I was before, I am to thee still,<\/p>\n

Close comrade of thy thoughts and hopes and toils,<\/p>\n

All happy contraries I would join for thee.<\/p>\n

All sweet relations
\nmarry in our life,<\/p>\n

I am thy kingdom even as thou art mine,<\/p>\n

The sovereign and the slave of thy desire, <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 719<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Thy prone possessor,
\nthe sister of thy soul<\/p>\n

And mother of thy wants; thou art my world,<\/p>\n

The earth I need, the heaven my thoughts desire,<\/p>\n

The world I inhabit and the god I adore.<\/p>\n

Thy body is my body’s counterpart<\/p>\n

Whose every limb my answering limb desires,<\/p>\n

Whose heart is key to all my heart-beats,\u2014this<\/p>\n

I am and thou to me, O Satyavan.<\/p>\n

Our wedded walk through life begins anew,<\/p>\n

No gladness lost, no
\ndepth of mortal joy;<\/p>\n

Let us go through
\nthis new world that is the same.<\/p>\n

For it is given back, but it is known,<\/p>\n

A playing-ground and dwelling-house of God<\/p>\n

Who hides himself in bird and beast and man<\/p>\n

Sweetly to find himself again by love,<\/p>\n

By oneness. His presence leads the rhythms of life<\/p>\n

That seek for mutual joy in spite of pain.<\/p>\n

We have each other found, O Satyavan,<\/p>\n

In the great light of the discovered soul.<\/p>\n

Let us go back, for eve is in the skies.<\/p>\n

Now grief is dead and serene bliss remains<\/p>\n

The heart of all our days for ever
\nmore.<\/p>\n

Lo, all these beings in this wonderful world!<\/p>\n

Let us give joy to all, for joy is ours.<\/p>\n

For not for ourselves alone our spirits came<\/p>\n

Out of the veil of the Unmanifest<\/span>,<\/p>\n

Out of the deep immense Unknowable<\/p>\n

Upon the ignorant
\nbreast of dubious earth<\/p>\n

Into the ways of labouring<\/span> seeking
\nmen,<\/p>\n

Two fires that burn towards that parent Sun,<\/p>\n

Two rays that travel to the original Light.<\/p>\n

To lead man’s soul towards
\nTruth and God we are born,<\/p>\n

To draw the chequered scheme of mortal life<\/p>\n

Into some semblance of the Immortal’s plan,<\/p>\n

To shape it closer to an image of God,<\/p>\n

A little nearer to the Idea divine.\u201d <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 720<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

She closed her arms about his breast and head<\/p>\n

As if to keep him on her bosom worn<\/p>\n

For ever through the journeying of the years.<\/p>\n

So for a while they stood entwined, their kiss<\/p>\n

And passion-tranced<\/span> embrace a
\nmeeting point<\/p>\n

In their commingling spirits, one for ever,<\/p>\n

Two-souled<\/span>, two-bodied for the
\njoy of Time.<\/p>\n

Then hand in hand they left that solemn place<\/p>\n

Full now of mute unusual memories,<\/p>\n

To the green distance of their sylvan home<\/p>\n

Returning slowly
\nthrough the forest’s heart:<\/p>\n

Round them the afternoon to evening changed;<\/p>\n

Light slipped down to the brightly sleeping verge,<\/p>\n

And the birds came back winging to their nests,<\/p>\n

And day and night leaned to each other’s arms.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now the dusk shadowy trees stood close around<\/p>\n

Like dreaming spirits and delaying night,<\/p>\n

The grey-eyed pensive evening heard their steps,<\/p>\n

And from all points the cries and movements came<\/p>\n

Of the four-footed wanderers of the night<\/p>\n

Approaching. Then a human rumour rose<\/p>\n

Long alien to their solitary days,<\/p>\n

Invading the charmed wilderness of leaves,<\/p>\n

Once sacred to secluded loneliness,<\/p>\n

With violent breaking of its virgin sleep.<\/p>\n

Through the screened dusk it deepened still and there neared<\/p>\n

Floating of many voices and the sound<\/p>\n

Of many feet till on their sight broke in,<\/p>\n

As if a coloured<\/span> wave upon the eye,<\/p>\n

The brilliant strenuous crowded
\nlife of man.<\/p>\n

Topped by a flaring multitude of lights<\/p>\n

A great resplendent company arrived.<\/p>\n

Life in its ordered tumult wavering came<\/p>\n

Bringing its stream of unknown faces, thronged<\/p>\n

With gold-fringed head-dresses, gold-broidered robes, <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 721<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Glittering of ornaments, fluttering of hems,<\/p>\n

Hundreds of hands parted the forest-boughs,<\/p>\n

Hundreds of eyes searched the entangled glades.<\/p>\n

Calm white-clad priests their grave-eyed sweetness brought,<\/p>\n

Strong warriors in their glorious armour<\/span>
\nshone,<\/p>\n

The proud-hooved<\/span> steeds came
\ntrampling through the wood.<\/p>\n

In front King Dyumathsena<\/span> walked,
\nno more<\/p>\n

Blind, faltering-limbed, but his far-questing eyes<\/p>\n

Restored to all their confidence in light<\/p>\n

Took seeingly<\/span> this imaged outer
\nworld;<\/p>\n

Firmly he trod with monarch steps the soil.<\/p>\n

By him that queen and mother’s anxious face<\/p>\n

Came changed from its habitual burdened look<\/p>\n

Which in its drooping strength of tired toil<\/p>\n

Had borne the fallen life of those she loved.<\/p>\n

Her patient paleness wore a pensive glow<\/p>\n

Like evening’s subdued gaze of gathered light<\/p>\n

Departing, which foresees sunrise her child.<\/p>\n

The brilliance of her rich receding gleam<\/p>\n

A thoughtful prophecy of lyric dawn,<\/p>\n

She lives awhile to muse upon that hope<\/p>\n

Sinking in quiet splendours<\/span> of her
\nsky.<\/p>\n

Her eyes were first to find her children’s forms.<\/p>\n

But at the vision of the beautiful twain<\/p>\n

The air awoke perturbed with scaling cries,<\/p>\n

And the swift parents hurrying to their child,\u2014<\/p>\n

Their cause of life now who had given him breath,\u2014<\/p>\n

Possessed him with their arms. Then tenderly<\/p>\n

Cried Dyumathsena<\/span> chiding Satyavan:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fortunate gods have looked on me today,<\/p>\n

A kingdom seeking came and heaven’s rays.<\/p>\n

But where wast<\/span> thou? Thou hast
\ntormented gladness<\/p>\n

With fear’s dull shadow, O my child, my life.<\/p>\n

What danger kept thee for the darkening woods?<\/p>\n

Or how could pleasure in her ways forget<\/p>\n

That useless orbs without thee are my eyes <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 722<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Which only for thy sake rejoice at light?<\/p>\n

Not like thyself was this done, Savitri,<\/p>\n

Who ledst<\/span> not back thy husband to
\nour arms,<\/p>\n

Knowing with him beside me only is taste<\/p>\n

In food and for his touch evening and morn<\/p>\n

I live content with my remaining days.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Satyavan replied
\nwith smiling lips:<\/p>\n

\u201cLay all on her; she is the cause of all.<\/p>\n

With her enchantments she has twined me round.<\/p>\n

Behold, at noon leaving this house of clay<\/p>\n

I wandered in far-off eternities,<\/p>\n

Yet still, a captive in her golden hands,<\/p>\n

I tread your little hillock called green earth<\/p>\n

And in the moments of your transient sun<\/p>\n

Live glad among the busy works of men.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then all eyes turned
\ntheir wondering looks where stood<\/p>\n

A deepening redder gold upon her cheeks,<\/p>\n

With lowered lids the noble lovely child,<\/p>\n

And one consenting
\nthought moved every breast:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat gleaming marvel of the earth or skies<\/p>\n

Stands silently by human Satyavan<\/p>\n

To mark a brilliance in the dusk of eve?<\/p>\n

If this is she of whom the world has heard,<\/p>\n

Wonder no more at any happy change.<\/p>\n

Each easy miracle of felicity<\/p>\n

Of her transmuting heart the alchemy is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then one spoke there who seemed a priest and sage:<\/p>\n

\u201cO woman soul, what light, what power revealed,<\/p>\n

Working the rapid marvels of this day,<\/p>\n

Opens for us by thee a happier age?\u201d<\/p>\n

Her lashes fluttering upwards gathered in<\/p>\n

To a vision which had scanned immortal things,<\/p>\n

Rejoicing, human forms for their delight.<\/p>\n

They claimed for their deep childlike motherhood<\/p>\n

The life of all these souls to be her life,<\/p>\n

Then falling veiled
\nthe light. Low she replied; <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 723<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

\u201cAwakened to the meaning of my heart,<\/p>\n

That to feel love and oneness is to live<\/p>\n

And this the magic of
\nour golden change<\/p>\n

Is all the truth I know or seek, O sage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wondering at her and her too luminous words<\/p>\n

Westward they turned in the fast gathering night.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

From the entangling verges freed they came<\/p>\n

Into a dimness of the sleeping earth<\/p>\n

And travelled<\/span> through her faint
\nand slumbering plains.<\/p>\n

Murmur and movement and the tread of men<\/p>\n

Broke the night’s solitude.
\nThe neigh of steeds<\/p>\n

Rose from the indistinct and voiceful<\/span>
\nsea<\/p>\n

Of life and all along its marchings<\/span>
\nswelled<\/p>\n

The rhyme of hooves, the chariot’s homeward voice.<\/p>\n

Drawn by white manes upon a high-roofed car<\/p>\n

In flare of the unsteady torches went<\/p>\n

With linked hands Satyavan and Savitri,<\/p>\n

Hearing a marriage march and nuptial hymn,<\/p>\n

Where waited them the many-voiced human world.<\/p>\n

Numberless the stars swam on their shadowy field<\/p>\n

Describing in the gloom the ways of light.<\/p>\n

Then while they skirted yet the southward verge,<\/p>\n

Lost in the halo of her musing brows<\/p>\n

Night, splendid with the moon dreaming in heaven<\/p>\n

In silver peace, possessed her luminous reign.<\/p>\n

She brooded through her stillness on a thought<\/p>\n

Deep-guarded by her mystic folds of light,<\/p>\n

And in her bosom nursed a greater dawn. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE END<\/b> <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 724<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n

 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Book Twelve   Epilogue      Epilogue    The Return to Earth    Out of abysmal trance her spirit woke. Lain on the earth-mother’s calm…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-29-savitri-volume-29","wpcat-22-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1017\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}