{"id":2980,"date":"2013-07-13T01:45:05","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T08:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2980"},"modified":"2013-11-28T15:02:59","modified_gmt":"2013-11-28T23:02:59","slug":"41-poems-from-manuscripts-circa-1912-1913-contd-vol-02-collected-poems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/02-collected-poems\/41-poems-from-manuscripts-circa-1912-1913-contd-vol-02-collected-poems","title":{"rendered":"-41_Poems from Manuscripts Circa 1912 – 1913 – Contd.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

 <\/td>\n

\n<\/p>\n

\n
\nThe Meditations of Mandavya<\/a><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tI<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nO joy of gaining all the soul’s desire!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO stranger joy of the defeat and loss!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO heart that yearnest to uplift the world!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO fiercer heart that bendest over its pain<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd drinkst the savour! I will love thee, O Love,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNaked or veiled or dreadfully disguised;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNot only when thou flatterest my heart<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut when thou tearst it. Thy sweet pity I love<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd mother’s care for creatures, for the joys<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI love thee that the lives of things possess,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd love thee for the torment of our pains;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNor cry, as some, against thy will, nor say<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThou art not. Easy is the love that lasts<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOnly with favours in the shopman heart!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWho, smitten, takes and gives the kiss, he loves.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t2<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nBlue-winged like turquoise, crimson-throated, beaked,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEnormous, fluttering over the garden wall<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe came to me, some moments on a bough<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWas perched, then flew away, leaving my heart<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEnchanted. It was as if thou saidst, "Behold, my love,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHow beautiful I am! To show thee this,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI came, my beauty. Now I flee away<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSince thou hast seen and lov’st." So dealst thou
\n\t\t\talways,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLuring and fleeing; but our hearts pursue.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t3<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nWhile on a terrace hushed I walked at night,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHe came and stung my foot. My soul surprised<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 509<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nRejoiced in lover’s contact; but the mind<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThought of a scorpion and was snared by forms.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStill, still my soul remembered its delight,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDenying mind, and midst the body’s pain,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI laughed contented.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t4<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAll is attained, attained! The pain is dead,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe striving. O thou joy that since this world<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBegan, wast waiting for me in thy lair.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO Wild Beast of the ways who torest my soul<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWith rapture felt as pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO cruelty divine! O pity fierce!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO timeless rapture of the nights that pass<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEmbraced, poignant and pure with Thy caress!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHumanity, acceptable I find<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThy ages that have wept out sweat and blood,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSince all was made to give its utter price<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo one wild moment of thy hidden God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLet the whole world end now, since all for which<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt was created is fulfilled at last<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd I am swallowed up in Thee, O God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tII<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nWho made of Nature here a tyrant? Who<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCondemned us to be slaves? It was not God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNay, we ourselves chose our own servitude<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd we ourselves have forged and heaped our
\n\t\t\tchains<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOn our own members. God only watched the while<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd mocked us sweetly at our childish task.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen if He seized us helpless in our bonds,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen if He played with us despite our cries<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd answered with His dreadful laugh our wrath,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOurs was the fault who chose that bondage first,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOurs is the folly whom His play affrights<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 510<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhile all the time He tells us, "It is nought."<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd now we say we never can be free,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor Nature binds us, for the fire must burn,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe water drown and death must seize his prey<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd grief and torture do their will with us<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd sin be like a lion with the world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBecause ’tis Nature. Man’s not infinite,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe proof is with us every day, they cry,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd God Himself’s a huge machine at last.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYet over us all the while Thought’s lightnings
\n\t\t\tplay<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd all the while within us works His love.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow more than when the play began, He laughs.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\n2<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow I believe that it is possible<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTo manage the arising clouds, to silence<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe thunder when it roars and put our rein<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUpon the lightnings. Only first within<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe god we must coerce who wallows here<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn love with his subjection and confined<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBy his own servants, wantonly enslaved<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTo every lure and every tempting bond.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd therefore man loves power, but power
\n\t\t\to’ercome,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nForce that accepts its limits. Wherefore then<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA limit? Why not dare the whole embrace,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe vast attraction? Let us risk extinction then<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf by that venture immortality<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd high omnipotence come near our grasp.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t‘Tis not the little rippling wayward seas,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNor all huge ocean tumbled by its storms<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThat can be our exemplar. The vault of heaven<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIs not a true similitude for man<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhose space outgyres thought’s last horizon.
\n\t\t\tSomething<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere is in us fears not the night beyond,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut breathless sails, unanchored, without helm,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhere mind and senses fail. Our naked soul<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 511<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nCan journey to the farther unshaped void<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhere nothing is except ourselves, arrive, hold
\n\t\t\ton,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNot shake, not ask return. Who accepts at last<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHis limit save the beast and plant and clod?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO to be perfect here, to exceed all bounds,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo feel the world a toy between our hands!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYet now enough that I have seized one current<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOf the tremendous Force that moves the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI know, O God, the day shall dawn at last<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhen man shall rise from playing with the mud<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd taking in his hands the sun and stars<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tRemould appearance, law and process old.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen, pain and discord vanished from the world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tShall the dead wilderness accept the rose<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the hushed desert babble of its rills;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMan once more seem the image true of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\n3<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI will not faint, O God. There is this thirst,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd thirst supposes water somewhere. Yes,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut in this life we may not ever find;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOld nature sits a phantom by the way,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOld passions may forbid, old doubts return.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen are there other lives here or beyond<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo satisfy us. I will persist, O Lord.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nIII<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhat is this Love that I have never found?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI have imagined in the skies a God,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd seen Him in the stirring of the leaves,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd heard Him in the purling of the brooks,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd feared Him in the lightning’s flashing tusk,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd missed Him in the mute eternal night,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd woke to Him in the returning Dawns.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd now I say there is no God at all,<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 512<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut only a dumb Void that belches forth<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNumberless larvae and phantasmal shapes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInto a void less happy than itself<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBecause this feels. O if this dream were true,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis iron, brute, gigantic helpless toy<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThey call a world, this thing that turns and
\n\t\t\tturns<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd shrieks and bleeds and cannot stop, this victim<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBroken and living yet on its own wheel,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd if a Will created this, what name<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tShall best blaspheme against that tyrant God?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLet all men seek it out and hurl it up<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAgainst Him with one cry, if yet perchance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nComplete denial may destroy His life<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWith happy end to His unhappy world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor where in all these stars is any sign of Love?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt is not here, but that which seems like Love<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIs a sleek cruel cheat that soon unmasks,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSent here to make the final suffering worse, 
\n\t\t\t\u2014
\n\t\t\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nNot Love, but Death disguised that strokes its food!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd all good in the world is only that.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA death that eats and eating is devoured,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis is the brutal image of the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLo, I have cursed Thee, lo, I have denied<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThy love, Thy being. Strike me with Thy rod,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tConvince me that Thou art. O leave it not<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTo Thy dumb messengers that have no heart,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNo wrath in the attack, no angered love,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNo exultation in the blow that falls,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe cry that answers. Let me feel a Heart,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven though an evil one, that throbs and is<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAgainst our tears, our pressure and our search.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBeware, for I will send my soul across the earth<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd all men turn against Thee at my word.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere is no sign, there comes not any voice.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd yet, alas! I know He will return<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 513<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nAnd He will soothe my wounds and charm my heart;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI shall again forgive, again shall love,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAgain shall suffer, be again deceived.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd where is any end, O Heaven, O Earth?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut there is never any end when one has loved.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nA sudden silence and a sudden sound,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe sound above and in another world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe silence here; and from the two a thought.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPerhaps the heart of God for ever sings<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd worlds come throbbing out from every note;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPerhaps His soul sits ever calm and still<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd listens to the music rapturously,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHimself adoring, by Himself adored.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSo were the singer and the hearer one<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEternally. The anthem buoyant rides<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor ever on the seas of Space and Time<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd worships the white Bliss from which ’twas
\n\t\t\tborn;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe ineffable Delight leans silent down<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd clasps the creatures of its mystic cry<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor ever and for ever without end.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nWho art thou that pursuest my desire<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLike a wild beast behind the jungle’s screen<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd throw’st a dread upon its fiercest fire,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA shadow on its flowering joy and green?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThou madest and deniest me my need,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThou jealous Lover and devouring Greed!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWho spoke of God? There is a hungry Beast<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn ambush for the world who all devours,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYet is his hunger sated not the least.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe tears our beauty, strength and happiest hours,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAnd eats our flesh and drinks our blood and
\n\t\t\ttears,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 514<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nRanging as in a thicket through the years.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nDost thou desire my last vain hope? Take it, rejoice!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWilt thou exact my dying bliss? Tear it and end!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut give me this at least, dying, to hear thy voice<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBy thee as foeman slain if never clasped as
\n\t\t\tfriend.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFoeman or friend, lover or slayer, only thee<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI need and feel, O personal Eternity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nIf what thou gavest, thou must needs again exact,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCancel thy forms, deny thy own accomplished fact,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWith what wilt thou replace them? Is thy nameless void<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEmbraceable by arms? Or can the soul upbuoyed<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRest on a shoreless emptiness without a name?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCan Love find rapture by renouncing all his
\n\t\t\tflame?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThou hast forgotten or our nature is misled.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLur’st thou to utter life beyond the silence
\n\t\t\tdead?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNot sound, nor silence, neither world nor void,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut the unthinkable, absolute, unalloyed<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOne, multitudinous, nameless, yet a Name,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInnumerably other, yet the same.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tImmeasurable ecstasy where Time<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd Space have fainted in a swoon sublime!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nOf silence I have tired, from the profounder Night<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI come rejected. All the immensities overhead<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAre given to my fierce upwinging soul at last<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tRapt into high impossible ranges huge outspread.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnnumbered voices thrill the silent waiting Vast,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA million flames converge into the rayless Light.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 515<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/font><\/font>\n\t\t\t<\/td>\n

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

  The Meditations of Mandavya   I   O joy of gaining all the soul’s desire! O stranger joy of the defeat and loss! O…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-02-collected-poems","wpcat-57-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980","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=2980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9567,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980\/revisions\/9567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}