{"id":2468,"date":"2013-07-13T01:41:50","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:41:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2468"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:41:50","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:41:50","slug":"31-canto-three-satyavan-and-savitri-vol-33-34-savitri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/33-34-savitri\/31-canto-three-satyavan-and-savitri-vol-33-34-savitri","title":{"rendered":"-31_Canto Three – Satyavan and Savitri.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\nCanto Three <\/font><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nSatyavan and Savitri<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/font>  <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO<\/font>UT OF<\/b> the voiceless mystery of the past<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn a present ignorant of forgotten bonds<\/p>\n

These spirits met upon the roads of Time.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYet in the heart their secret conscious selves<\/p>\n

At once aware grew of each other warned<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBy the first call of a delightful voice<\/p>\n

And a first vision of the destined face.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAs when being cries to being from its depths<\/p>\n

Behind the screen of the external sense<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd strives to find the heart-disclosing word,<\/p>\n

The passionate speech revealing the soul’s need,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut the mind’s ignorance veils the inner sight,<\/p>\n

Only a little breaks through our earth-made bounds,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo now they met in that momentous hour,<\/p>\n

So utter the recognition in the deeps,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe remembrance lost, the oneness felt and missed.<\/p>\n

Thus Satyavan spoke first to Savitri:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“O thou who com’st to me out of Time’s silences,<\/p>\n

Yet thy voice has wakened my heart to an unknown bliss,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tImmortal or mortal only in thy frame,<\/p>\n

For more than earth speaks to me from thy soul<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd more than earth surrounds me in thy gaze,<\/p>\n

How art thou named among the sons of men?<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhence hast thou dawned filling my spirit’s days,<\/p>\n

Brighter than summer, brighter than my flowers,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tInto the lonely borders of my life,<\/p>\n

O sunlight moulded like a golden maid?<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI know that mighty gods are friends of earth.<\/p>\n

Amid the pageantries of day and dusk,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLong have I travelled with my pilgrim soul<\/p>\n

Moved by the marvel of familiar things.<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>400<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Earth could not hide from me the powers she veils:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEven though moving mid an earthly scene<\/p>\n

And the common surfaces of terrestrial things,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMy vision saw unblinded by her forms;<\/p>\n

The Godhead looked at me from familiar scenes.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI witnessed the virgin bridals of the dawn<\/p>\n

Behind the glowing curtains of the sky<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr vying in joy with the bright morning’s steps<\/p>\n

I paced along the slumbrous coasts of noon,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr the gold desert of the sunlight crossed<\/p>\n

Traversing great wastes of splendour and of fire,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr met the moon gliding amazed through heaven<\/p>\n

In the uncertain wideness of the night,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr the stars marched on their long sentinel routes<\/p>\n

Pointing their spears through the infinitudes:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe day and dusk revealed to me hidden shapes;<\/p>\n

Figures have come to me from secret shores<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd happy faces looked from ray and flame.<\/p>\n

I have heard strange voices cross the ether’s waves,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe Centaur’s wizard song has thrilled my ear;<\/p>\n

I have glimpsed the Apsaras bathing in the pools,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI have seen the wood-nymphs peering through the leaves;<\/p>\n

The winds have shown to me their trampling lords,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI have beheld the princes of the Sun<\/p>\n

Burning in thousand-pillared homes of light.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo now my mind could dream and my heart fear<\/p>\n

That from some wonder-couch beyond our air<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tRisen in a wide morning of the gods<\/p>\n

Thou drov’st thy horses from the Thunderer’s worlds.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAlthough to heaven thy beauty seems allied,<\/p>\n

Much rather would my thoughts rejoice to know<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThat mortal sweetness smiles between thy lids<\/p>\n

And thy heart can beat beneath a human gaze<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd thy aureate bosom quiver with a look<\/p>\n

And its tumult answer to an earth-born voice.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf our time-vexed affections thou canst feel,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>401<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Earth’s ease of simple things can satisfy,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf thy glance can dwell content on earthly soil,<\/p>\n

And this celestial summary of delight,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThy golden body, dally with fatigue<\/p>\n

Oppressing with its grace our terrain, while<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe frail sweet passing taste of earthly food<\/p>\n

Delays thee and the torrent’s leaping wine,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDescend. Let thy journey cease, come down to us.<\/p>\n

Close is my father’s creepered hermitage<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tScreened by the tall ranks of these silent kings,<\/p>\n

Sung to by voices of the hue-robed choirs<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhose chants repeat transcribed in music’s notes<\/p>\n

The passionate coloured lettering of the boughs<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd fill the hours with their melodious cry.<\/p>\n

Amid the welcome-hum of many bees<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tInvade our honied kingdom of the woods;<\/p>\n

There let me lead thee into an opulent life.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBare, simple is the sylvan hermit-life;<\/p>\n

Yet is it clad with the jewelry of earth.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWild winds run — visitors midst the swaying tops,<\/p>\n

Through the calm days heaven’s sentinels of peace<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCouched on a purple robe of sky above<\/p>\n

Look down on a rich secrecy and hush<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd the chambered nuptial waters chant within.<\/p>\n

Enormous, whispering, many-formed around<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHigh forest gods have taken in their arms<\/p>\n

The human hour, a guest of their centuried pomps.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tApparelled are the morns in gold and green,<\/p>\n

Sunlight and shadow tapestry the walls<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo make a resting chamber fit for thee.”<\/p>\n

Awhile she paused as if hearing still his voice,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tUnwilling to break the charm, then slowly spoke.<\/p>\n

Musing she answered, “I am Savitri,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPrincess of Madra. Who art thou? What name<\/p>\n

Musical on earth expresses thee to men?<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhat trunk of kings watered by fortunate streams<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>402<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Has flowered at last upon one happy branch?<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhy is thy dwelling in the pathless wood<\/p>\n

Far from the deeds thy glorious youth demands,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHaunt of the anchorites and earth’s wilder broods,<\/p>\n

Where only with thy witness self thou roamst<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn Nature’s green unhuman loneliness<\/p>\n

Surrounded by enormous silences<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd the blind murmur of primaeval calms?”<\/p>\n

And Satyavan replied to Savitri:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“In days when yet his sight looked clear on life,<\/p>\n

King Dyumatsena once, the Shalwa, reigned<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThrough all the tract which from behind these tops<\/p>\n

Passing its days of emerald delight<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn trusting converse with the traveller winds<\/p>\n

Turns, looking back towards the southern heavens,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd leans its flank upon the musing hills.<\/p>\n

But equal Fate removed her covering hand.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA living night enclosed the strong man’s paths,<\/p>\n

Heaven’s brilliant gods recalled their careless gifts,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTook from blank eyes their glad and helping ray<\/p>\n

And led the uncertain goddess from his side.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOutcast from empire of the outer light,<\/p>\n

Lost to the comradeship of seeing men,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHe sojourns in two solitudes, within<\/p>\n

And in the solemn rustle of the woods.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSon of that king, I, Satyavan, have lived<\/p>\n

Contented, for not yet of thee aware,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn my high-peopled loneliness of spirit<\/p>\n

And this huge vital murmur kin to me,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNursed by the vastness, pupil of solitude.<\/p>\n

Great Nature came to her recovered child;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI reigned in a kingdom of a nobler kind<\/p>\n

Than men can build upon dull Matter’s soil;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI met the frankness of the primal earth,<\/p>\n

I enjoyed the intimacy of infant God.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn the great tapestried chambers of her state,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>403<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Free in her boundless palace I have dwelt<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIndulged by the warm mother of us all,<\/p>\n

Reared with my natural brothers in her house.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI lay in the wide bare embrace of heaven,<\/p>\n

The sunlight’s radiant blessing clasped my brow,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe moonbeams’ silver ecstasy at night<\/p>\n

Kissed my dim lids to sleep. Earth’s morns were mine;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLured by faint murmurings with the green-robed hours<\/p>\n

I wandered lost in woods, prone to the voice<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOf winds and waters, partner of the sun’s joy,<\/p>\n

A listener to the universal speech:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMy spirit satisfied within me knew<\/p>\n

Godlike our birthright, luxuried our life<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhose close belongings are the earth and skies.<\/p>\n

Before Fate led me into this emerald world,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAroused by some foreshadowing touch within,<\/p>\n

An early prescience in my mind approached<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe great dumb animal consciousness of earth<\/p>\n

Now grown so close to me who have left old pomps<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo live in this grandiose murmur dim and vast.<\/p>\n

Already I met her in my spirit’s dream.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAs if to a deeper country of the soul<\/p>\n

Transposing the vivid imagery of earth,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThrough an inner seeing and sense a wakening came.<\/p>\n

A visioned spell pursued my boyhood’s hours,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll things the eye had caught in coloured lines<\/p>\n

Were seen anew through the interpreting mind<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd in the shape it sought to seize the soul.<\/p>\n

An early child-god took my hand that held,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMoved, guided by the seeking of his touch,<\/p>\n

Bright forms and hues which fled across his sight;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLimned upon page and stone they spoke to men.<\/p>\n

High beauty’s visitants my intimates were.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe neighing pride of rapid life that roams<\/p>\n

Wind-maned through our pastures, on my seeing mood<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCast shapes of swiftness; trooping spotted deer<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>404<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tAgainst the vesper sky became a song<\/p>\n

Of evening to the silence of my soul.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI caught for some eternal eye the sudden<\/p>\n

King-fisher flashing to a darkling pool;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA slow swan silvering the azure lake,<\/p>\n

A shape of magic whiteness, sailed through dream;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeaves trembling with the passion of the wind,<\/p>\n

Pranked butterflies, the conscious flowers of air,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd wandering wings in blue infinity<\/p>\n

Lived on the tablets of my inner sight;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMountains and trees stood there like thoughts from God.<\/p>\n

The brilliant long-bills in their vivid dress,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe peacock scattering on the breeze his moons<\/p>\n

Painted my memory like a frescoed wall.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI carved my vision out of wood and stone;<\/p>\n

I caught the echoes of a word supreme<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd metred the rhythm-beats of infinity<\/p>\n

And listened through music for the eternal Voice.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI felt a covert touch, I heard a call,<\/p>\n

But could not clasp the body of my God<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr hold between my hands the World-Mother’s feet.<\/p>\n

In men I met strange portions of a Self<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThat sought for fragments and in fragments lived:<\/p>\n

Each lived in himself and for himself alone<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd with the rest joined only fleeting ties;<\/p>\n

Each passioned over his surface joy and grief,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNor saw the Eternal in his secret house.<\/p>\n

I conversed with Nature, mused with the changeless stars,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGod’s watch-fires burning in the ignorant Night,<\/p>\n

And saw upon her mighty visage fall<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA ray prophetic of the Eternal’s sun.<\/p>\n

I sat with the forest sages in their trance:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThere poured awakening streams of diamond light,<\/p>\n

I glimpsed the presence of the One in all.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut still there lacked the last transcendent power<\/p>\n

And Matter still slept empty of its Lord.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>405<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

The Spirit was saved, the body lost and mute<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLived still with Death and ancient Ignorance;<\/p>\n

The Inconscient was its base, the Void its fate.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut thou hast come and all will surely change:<\/p>\n

I shall feel the World-Mother in thy golden limbs<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd hear her wisdom in thy sacred voice.<\/p>\n

The child of the Void shall be reborn in God,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMy Matter shall evade the Inconscient’s trance.<\/p>\n

My body like my spirit shall be free.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt shall escape from Death and Ignorance.”<\/p>\n

And Savitri, musing still, replied to him:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“Speak more to me, speak more, O Satyavan,<\/p>\n

Speak of thyself and all thou art within;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI would know thee as if we had ever lived<\/p>\n

Together in the chamber of our souls.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSpeak till a light shall come into my heart<\/p>\n

And my moved mortal mind shall understand<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhat all the deathless being in me feels.<\/p>\n

It knows that thou art he my spirit has sought<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAmidst earth’s thronging visages and forms<\/p>\n

Across the golden spaces of my life.”<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd Satyavan like a replying harp<\/p>\n

To the insistent calling of a flute<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnswered her questioning and let stream to her<\/p>\n

His heart in many-coloured waves of speech:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“O golden princess, perfect Savitri,<\/p>\n

More I would tell than failing words can speak,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOf all that thou hast meant to me, unknown,<\/p>\n

All that the lightning-flash of love reveals<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn one great hour of the unveiling gods.<\/p>\n

Even a brief nearness has reshaped my life.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor now I know that all I lived and was<\/p>\n

Moved towards this moment of my heart’s rebirth;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI look back on the meaning of myself,<\/p>\n

A soul made ready on earth’s soil for thee.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOnce were my days like days of other men:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>406<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

To think and act was all, to enjoy and breathe;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis was the width and height of mortal hope:<\/p>\n

Yet there came glimpses of a deeper self<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThat lives behind Life and makes her act its scene.<\/p>\n

A truth was felt that screened its shape from mind,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA Greatness working towards a hidden end,<\/p>\n

And vaguely through the forms of earth there looked<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSomething that life is not and yet must be.<\/p>\n

I groped for the Mystery with the lantern, Thought.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIts glimmerings lighted with the abstract word<\/p>\n

A half-visible ground and travelling yard by yard<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt mapped a system of the Self and God.<\/p>\n

I could not live the truth it spoke and thought.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI turned to seize its form in visible things,<\/p>\n

Hoping to fix its rule by mortal mind,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tImposed a narrow structure of world-law<\/p>\n

Upon the freedom of the Infinite,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA hard firm skeleton of outward Truth,<\/p>\n

A mental scheme of a mechanic Power.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis light showed more the darknesses unsearched;<\/p>\n

It made the original Secrecy more occult;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt could not analyse its cosmic Veil<\/p>\n

Or glimpse the Wonder-worker’s hidden hand<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd trace the pattern of his magic plans.<\/p>\n

I plunged into an inner seeing Mind<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd knew the secret laws and sorceries<\/p>\n

That make of Matter mind’s bewildered slave:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe mystery was not solved but deepened more.<\/p>\n

I strove to find its hints through Beauty and Art,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut Form cannot unveil the indwelling Power;<\/p>\n

Only it throws its symbols at our hearts.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt evoked a mood of self, invoked a sign<\/p>\n

Of all the brooding glory hidden in sense:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI lived in the ray but faced not to the sun.<\/p>\n

I looked upon the world and missed the Self,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd when I found the Self, I lost the world,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>407<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

My other selves I lost and the body of God,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe link of the finite with the Infinite,<\/p>\n

The bridge between the appearance and the Truth,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe mystic aim for which the world was made,<\/p>\n

The human sense of Immortality.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut now the gold link comes to me with thy feet<\/p>\n

And His gold sun has shone on me from thy face.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor now another realm draws near with thee<\/p>\n

And now diviner voices fill my ear,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA strange new world swims to me in thy gaze<\/p>\n

Approaching like a star from unknown heavens;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA cry of spheres comes with thee and a song<\/p>\n

Of flaming gods. I draw a wealthier breath<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd in a fierier march of moments move.<\/p>\n

My mind transfigures to a rapturous seer.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA foam-leap travelling from the waves of bliss<\/p>\n

Has changed my heart and changed the earth around:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll with thy coming fills. Air, soil and stream<\/p>\n

Wear bridal raiment to be fit for thee<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd sunlight grows a shadow of thy hue<\/p>\n

Because of change within me by thy look.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCome nearer to me from thy car of light<\/p>\n

On this green sward disdaining not our soil.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor here are secret spaces made for thee<\/p>\n

Whose caves of emerald long to screen thy form.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWilt thou not make this mortal bliss thy sphere?<\/p>\n

Descend, O happiness, with thy moon-gold feet<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEnrich earth’s floors upon whose sleep we lie.<\/p>\n

O my bright beauty’s princess Savitri,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBy my delight and thy own joy compelled<\/p>\n

Enter my life, thy chamber and thy shrine.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn the great quietness where spirits meet,<\/p>\n

Led by my hushed desire into my woods<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLet the dim rustling arches over thee lean;<\/p>\n

One with the breath of things eternal live,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThy heart-beats near to mine, till there shall leap<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>408<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Enchanted from the fragrance of the flowers<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA moment which all murmurs shall recall<\/p>\n

And every bird remember in its cry.”<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAllured to her lashes by his passionate words<\/p>\n

Her fathomless soul looked out at him from her eyes;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPassing her lips in liquid sounds it spoke.<\/p>\n

This word alone she uttered and said all:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“O Satyavan, I have heard thee and I know;<\/p>\n

I know that thou and only thou art he.”<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen down she came from her high carven car<\/p>\n

Descending with a soft and faltering haste;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHer many-hued raiment glistening in the light<\/p>\n

Hovered a moment over the wind-stirred grass,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMixed with a glimmer of her body’s ray<\/p>\n

Like lovely plumage of a settling bird.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHer gleaming feet upon the green-gold sward<\/p>\n

Scattered a memory of wandering beams<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd lightly pressed the unspoken desire of earth<\/p>\n

Cherished in her too brief passing by the soil.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen flitting like pale-brilliant moths her hands<\/p>\n

Took from the sylvan verge’s sunlit arms<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA load of their jewel-faces’ clustering swarms,<\/p>\n

Companions of the spring-time and the breeze.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA candid garland set with simple forms<\/p>\n

Her rapid fingers taught a flower song,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe stanzaed movement of a marriage hymn.<\/p>\n

Profound in perfume and immersed in hue<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThey mixed their yearning’s coloured signs and made<\/p>\n

The bloom of their purity and passion one.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA sacrament of joy in treasuring palms<\/p>\n

She brought, flower-symbol of her offered life,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen with raised hands that trembled a little now<\/p>\n

At the very closeness that her soul desired,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis bond of sweetness, their bright union’s sign,<\/p>\n

She laid on the bosom coveted by her love.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>409<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

As if inclined before some gracious god<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWho has out of his mist of greatness shone<\/p>\n

To fill with beauty his adorer’s hours,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tShe bowed and touched his feet with worshipping hands;<\/p>\n

She made her life his world for him to tread<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd made her body the room of his delight,<\/p>\n

Her beating heart a remembrancer of bliss.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHe bent to her and took into his own<\/p>\n

Their married yearning joined like folded hopes;<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAs if a whole rich world suddenly possessed,<\/p>\n

Wedded to all he had been, became himself,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAn inexhaustible joy made his alone,<\/p>\n

He gathered all Savitri into his clasp.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAround her his embrace became the sign<\/p>\n

Of a locked closeness through slow intimate years,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA first sweet summary of delight to come,<\/p>\n

One brevity intense of all long life.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn a wide moment of two souls that meet<\/p>\n

She felt her being flow into him as in waves<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA river pours into a mighty sea.<\/p>\n

As when a soul is merging into God<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo live in Him for ever and know His joy,<\/p>\n

Her consciousness grew aware of him alone<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd all her separate self was lost in his.<\/p>\n

As a starry heaven encircles happy earth,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHe shut her into himself in a circle of bliss<\/p>\n

And shut the world into himself and her.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA boundless isolation made them one;<\/p>\n

He was aware of her enveloping him<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd let her penetrate his very soul<\/p>\n

As is a world by the world’s spirit filled,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAs the mortal wakes into Eternity,<\/p>\n

As the finite opens to the Infinite.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThus were they in each other lost awhile,<\/p>\n

Then drawing back from their long ecstasy’s trance<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCame into a new self and a new world.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>410<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

Each now was a part of the other’s unity,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe world was but their twin self-finding’s scene<\/p>\n

Or their own wedded being’s vaster frame.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOn the high glowing cupola of the day<\/p>\n

Fate tied a knot with morning’s halo threads<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhile by the ministry of an auspice-hour<\/p>\n

Heart-bound before the sun, their marriage fire,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe wedding of the eternal Lord and Spouse<\/p>\n

Took place again on earth in human forms:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn a new act of the drama of the world<\/p>\n

The united Two began a greater age.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn the silence and murmur of that emerald world<\/p>\n

And the mutter of the priest-wind’s sacred verse,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAmid the choral whispering of the leaves<\/p>\n

Love’s twain had joined together and grew one.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe natural miracle was wrought once more:<\/p>\n

In the immutable ideal world<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOne human moment was eternal made.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen down the narrow path where their lives had met<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHe led and showed to her her future world,<\/p>\n

Love’s refuge and corner of happy solitude.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAt the path’s end through a green cleft in the trees<\/p>\n

She saw a clustering line of hermit-roofs<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd looked now first on her heart’s future home,<\/p>\n

The thatch that covered the life of Satyavan.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAdorned with creepers and red climbing flowers<\/p>\n

It seemed a sylvan beauty in her dreams<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSlumbering with brown body and tumbled hair<\/p>\n

In her chamber inviolate of emerald peace.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAround it stretched the forest’s anchorite mood<\/p>\n

Lost in the depths of its own solitude.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen moved by the deep joy she could not speak,<\/p>\n

A little depth of it quivering in her words,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHer happy voice cried out to Satyavan:<\/p>\n

“My heart will stay here on this forest verge<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>411<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

And close to this thatched roof while I am far:<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow of more wandering it has no need.<\/p>\n

But I must haste back to my father’s house<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhich soon will lose one loved accustomed tread<\/p>\n

And listen in vain for a once cherished voice.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor soon I shall return nor ever again<\/p>\n

Oneness must sever its recovered bliss<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr fate sunder our lives while life is ours.”<\/p>\n

Once more she mounted on the carven car<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd under the ardour of a fiery noon<\/p>\n

Less bright than the splendour of her thoughts and dreams<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tShe sped swift-reined, swift-hearted but still saw<\/p>\n

In still lucidities of sight’s inner world<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThrough the cool-scented wood’s luxurious gloom<\/p>\n

On shadowy paths between great rugged trunks<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPace towards a tranquil clearing Satyavan.<\/p>\n

A nave of trees enshrined the hermit thatch,<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe new deep covert of her felicity,<\/p>\n

Preferred to heaven her soul’s temple and home.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis now remained with her, her heart’s constant scene.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEND OF<\/font>
\n\t\t\tCANTO<\/font> THREE<\/font><\/p>\n

END OF<\/font>
\n\t\t\tBOOK<\/font> FIVE<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>412<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

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

  Canto Three   Satyavan and Savitri   OUT OF the voiceless mystery of the past In a present ignorant of forgotten bonds These spirits…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-33-34-savitri","wpcat-50-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468","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=2468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}