{"id":174,"date":"2013-07-13T01:26:23","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:26:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=174"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:26:23","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:26:23","slug":"60-the-golden-bird-vol-07-collected-plays-part-ii-volume-07","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/07-collected-plays-part-ii-volume-07\/60-the-golden-bird-vol-07-collected-plays-part-ii-volume-07","title":{"rendered":"-60_The Golden Bird.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\n
\nThe Golden Bird <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 
\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nI<\/font>T WAS <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b>
\nin the forests of Asan that the Golden Bird first flew out from a flower-besieged thicket and fluttered
\nbefore the dazzled eyes of Luilla. It was in the forests of Asan, \u2014
\nthe open and impenetrable, the haunt of the dancers and untrodden of human feet, coiling place of the cobra and the Python,
\nlair of the lion and jaguar, formidable retreat of the fleeing antelope, yet the green home of human safety where a man and a
\nmaiden could walk in the moonlit night and hear unconcerned
\nthe far-off broil of the Kings of the wilderness. It was into the
\nfriendly and open places that the golden bird fluttered, but it
\ncame no less from the coverts of dread and mystery. From the
\ndeath and the night it flew out into the sunlight where Luilla
\nwas happily straying.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nLuilla loved to wander on the verges of danger, just where
\nthose flower-besieged thickets began and formed for miles together a thorny and tangled rampart full at once of allurement and
\nmenace. She did not venture in, for she had a great fear of the
\nthorns and brambles and a high respect for her radiant beauty,
\nher own constant object of worship and the daily delight of all
\nwho dwell for a while on earth labouring the easy and kindly soil
\non the verges of the forests of Asan. But always she wandered
\nclose to the flowery wall and her mind, safe in its voluntary in-
\ncorporeality, strayed like a many-hued butterfly, far into the
\nforbidden region which the gods had so carefully secluded. Per-
\nhaps secretly she hoped that some day some kingly and leonine
\nhead would thrust itself out through the flowers and compel her
\nwith a gaze of friendly and majestic invitation or else that the
\ngreen poisonous head of a serpent reposing itself on a flower
\nwould scrutinise her out of narrow eyes and express a cunning
\napproval of her beauty. It was not out of fear of the lions and
\nthe serpents that Luilla forbore to enter the secret places. She
\nknew she could overcome the most ferocious intentions of any<\/font>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage \u20131052<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ndestroyer in the world, firm-footed or footless, if only he would
\ngive her three minutes before making up his mind to eat or bite
\nher. But neither lion nor serpent strayed out of these appointed
\nhaunts. It was the golden bird that first fluttered out from the
\nthickets to Luilla.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nLuilla looked at it as it flitted from bough to bough, and her
\neyes were dazzled and her soul wondered. For the little body of
\nthe bird was an inconstant flame of flying and fleeting gold and
\nthe wings that opened and fluttered were of living gold and the small shapely
\nhead was crested gold and the long graceful quivering tail was trailing feathered gold; all was gold about the bird,
\nexcept the eyes and they were two jewels of a soft everchanging
\ncolour and sheltered strange-looking depths of love and thought
\nin their gentle brilliance. On the bough where it perched, it
\nseemed as if all the soft-shaded leaves were suddenly sunlit. For
\nas Luilla accustomed her eyes to the flickering brightness of the
\ngolden bird, it hovered at last on a branch, settled and sang.
\nAnd its voice also was of gold.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe bird sang in its own high secret language; but Luilla’s
\near understood its thoughts and in Luilla’s soul as it thirsted and
\nlistened and trembled with delight, the song shaped itself easily
\ninto human speech. This then was what the bird sang \u2014 the bird
\nthat came out of the Death’s night, sang to Luilla a song of
\nbeauty and of delight:<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\n"Luilla! Luilla! Luilla! green and beautiful are the meadows
\nwhere the children run and pluck the flowers and green and
\nbeautiful the pastures where the calm-eyed cattle graze, green
\nand beautiful the corn-field ripening on the village bounds, but
\ngreener are the impenetrable thickets of Asan than her open
\nplaces of life, and more beautiful than the meadows and the
\npastures and the cornfields are the forests of death and night. More ensnaring
\nto some is the danger of the jaguar than the attractive face of a child, more welcome the foot-tracks of the lion
\nas it haunts the pastures of the cattle, more fair and fruitful the
\nthorn and the wild briar than the fields full of ripening grain.
\nAnd this I know that no such flowers bloom in the safety and
\nease of Asan’s meadows, though they make a thick and divine<\/font>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage \u20131053<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ntreading for luxurious feet, as I have seen blooming on the borders of the wild morass, in the heart of the bramble thicket and
\nover the mouth of the serpent’s lair. Shall I not take thee, O
\nLuilla! into those woods? Thou shalt pluck the flowers in the
\nforests of night and death, thou shalt lay thy hands on the lion’s
\nmane.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nO Luilla! O Luilla! O Luilla!"<\/font>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage \u20131054<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Golden Bird     IT WAS in the forests of Asan that the Golden Bird first flew out from a flower-besieged thicket and fluttered…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-07-collected-plays-part-ii-volume-07","wpcat-6-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174","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=174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}