{"id":3305,"date":"2013-07-13T01:47:21","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:47:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3305"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:47:21","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:47:21","slug":"03-book-4-canto-2-the-growth-of-the-flame-vol-02-savitri-1951","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/02-other-editions\/01-savitri\/02-savitri-1951\/03-book-4-canto-2-the-growth-of-the-flame-vol-02-savitri-1951","title":{"rendered":"-03_Book 4 Canto 2 The Growth of The Flame.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\n

<\/p>\n

CANTO TWO<\/font><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

THE GROWTH OF THE FLAME<\/font> <\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\t\t\t <\/td>\n\n

\n

A LAND of mountains and wide sun-beat plains
And giant rivers
\npacing to vast seas,
A field of creation and spiritual hush,
Silence
\nswallowing life's acts into the deeps,
Of thought's transcendent climb and
\nheavenward leap,
A brooding world of reverie and trance,
Filled with the
\nmightiest works of God and man,
Where Nature seemed a dream of the Divine
\nAnd beauty and grace and grandeur had their home,
Harboured the childhood of
\nthe incarnate Flame. 
Over her watched millennial influences
And the
\ndeep godheads of a grandiose past
\nLooked on her and saw the future's godheads come
As if this magnet drew their
\npowers unseen.
Earth's brooding wisdom spoke to her still breast,
Mounting
\nfrom mind's last peaks to mate with gods,
Making earth's brilliant thoughts a
\nspringing board
To dive into the cosmic vastnesses,
The knowledge of the
\nthinker and the seer
Saw the unseen and thought the unthinkable,
Opened
\nthe enormous doors of the unknown,
Rent Man's horizons into infinity.
A
\nshoreless sweep was lent to the mortal's acts,
And art and beauty sprang from
\nthe human depths;
Nature and soul vied in nobility.
Ethics the human
\nkeyed to imitate heaven;
The harmony of a rich culture's tones
Refined the
\nsense and magnified its reach "
To hear the unheard and glimpse the invisible
\nAnd taught the soul to soar beyond things known <\/font>
\n
\n <\/font><\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page-12<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nInspiring life to greaten and break its bounds
Aspiring to the Immortals'
\nunseen world.
Leaving earth's safety daring wings of Mind
Bore her above
\nthe trodden fields of thought
Crossing the mystic seas of the Beyond
To
\nlive on eagle heights near to the Sun.
There wisdom sits on her eternal
\nthrone.
All her life's turns led her to symbol doors
Admitting to secret
\nPowers that were her kin;
Adept of truth, initiate of bliss,
A mystic
\nacolyte trained in Nature's school,
Aware of the marvel of created things
\nShe laid the secrecies of her heart's deep muse
Upon the altar of the
\nWonderful,
Her hours were ritual in a timeless fane,
Her acts became
\ngestures of sacrifice.
Invested with a rhythm of higher spheres
The word
\nwas used as a hieratic means
For the release of the imprisoned spirit
Into
\ncommunion with its comrade gods,
<\/i>Or it helped to beat out new
\nexpressive forms
Of that which labours in the heart of life,
Some
\nimmemorial Soul in men and things,
Seeker of the Unknown and the Unborn
\nCarrying a light from the Ineffable
To rend the veil of the last mysteries.
\nIntense philosophies pointed earth to heaven
Or on foundations broad as
\ncosmic Space
Upraised the earth-mind to superhuman heights.
Overpassing
\nlines that please the outward eyes
But hide the sight of that which lives
\nwithin
Sculpture and painting concentrated sense
Upon an inner vision's
\nmotionless verge,
Revealed a figure of the invisible,
Unveiled all
\nNature's meaning in a form,
Or caught into a body the Divine.
The
\narchitecture of the Infinite
Discovered here its inward-musing shapes
\nCaptured into wide breadths of soaring stone:
Music brought down celestial
\nyearnings, song <\/font>\n<\/p>\n

\nPage- 13<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nHeld the merged heart absorbed in rapturous depths,
Linking the human with
\nthe cosmic cry;
The world-interpreting movements of the dance
Moulded idea
\nand mood to a rhythmic sway
And posture; crafts minute in subtle lines
\nEternised a swift moment's memory
Or showed in a carving's sweep, a cup's
\ndesign
The underlying patterns of the unseen:
Poems in largeness cast like
\nmoving worlds
And metres surging with the ocean's voice
Translated by
\ngrandeurs locked in Nature's heart
But thrown now into a crowded glory of
\nspeech
The beauty and sublimity of her forms,
The passion of her moments
\nand her moods
Lifting the human word near to the god's.
Man's eyes could
\nlook into the inner realms;
His scrutiny discovered number's law
And
\norganised the motions of the stars,
Mapped out the visible fashioning of the
\nworld,
Questioned the process of his thoughts or made
A theorised diagram
\nof mind and life.
These things she took in as her nature's food,
But these
\nalone could fill not her wide Self:
A human seeking limited by its gains,
\nTo her they seemed the great and early steps
Hazardous of a young discovering
\nspirit
Which saw not yet by its own native light;
It tapped the universe
\nwith testing knocks
Or stretched to find Truth-mind's divining rod;
A
\ngrowing out there was to numberless sides,
But not the widest seeing of the
\nsoul,
Not yet the vast direct immediate touch,
Nor yet the art and wisdom
\nof the Gods.
A boundless knowledge greater than man's thought,
A happiness
\ntoo high for heart and sense
Locked in the world and yearning for release
\nShe felt in her; waiting as yet for form,
It asked for objects around which
\nto grow
And natures strong to bear without recoil
The splendour of her
\nnative royalty, <\/font> <\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page – 14<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nHer greatness and her sweetness and her bliss,
Her might to possess and her
\nvast power to love:
Earth made a stepping-stone to conquer heaven,
The
\nsoul saw beyond heaven's limiting boundaries,
Met a great light from the
\nUnknowable
And dreamed of a transcendent action's sphere.
Aware of the
\nuniversal Self in all
She turned to living hearts and human forms,
Her
\nsoul's reflections, complements, counterparts,
The close outlying portions of
\nher being
Divided from her by walls of body and mind
Yet to her spirit
\nbound by ties divine.
Overcoming invisible hedge and masked defence
And
\nthe loneliness that separates soul from soul,
She wished to make all one
\nimmense embrace
That she might house in it all living things
Raised into a
\nsplendid point of seeing light
Out of division's dense inconsdent cleft,
\nAnd make them one with God and world and her.<\/b>
Only a few responded to
\nher call:
Still fewer felt the screened divinity
And strove to mate its
\ngodhead with their own,
Approaching with some kinship to her heights.
\nUplifted towards luminous secrecies
Or conscious of some splendour hidden
\nabove
They leaped to find her in a moment's flash,
Glimpsing a light in a
\ncelestial vast,
But could not keep the vision and the power
And fell back
\nto life's dull ordinary tone.
A mind daring heavenly experiment,
Growing
\ntowards some largeness they felt near,
Testing the unknown's bound with eager
\ntouch
They still were prisoned by their human grain:
They could not keep
\nup with her tireless step;
Too small and eager for her large-paced will,
\nToo narrow to look with the unborn Infinite's gaze
Their nature weary grew of
\nthings too great.
For even the close partners of her thoughts
Who could
\nhave walked the nearest to her ray,
Worshipped the power and light they felt
\nin her <\/font> <\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page – 15<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nBut could not match the measure of her soul.
A friend and yet too great
\nwholly to know,
She walked in their front towards a greater light,
Their
\nleader and queen over their hearts and souls,
One close to their bosoms, yet
\ndivine and far.
Admiring and amazed they saw her stride
Attempting with a
\ngodlike rush and leap
Heights for their human stature too remote
Or with a
\nslow great many-sided toil
Pushing towards aims they hardly could conceive;
\nYet forced to be the satellites of her sun
They moved unable to forego her
\nlight,
Desiring they clutched at her with outstretched hands
Or followed
\nstumbling in the paths she made.
Or longing with their self of life and flesh
\nThey clung to her for heart's nourishment and support:
The rest they could
\nnot see in visible light;
Vaguely they bore her inner mightiness.
Or bound
\nby the senses and the longing heart,
Adoring with a turbid human love,
\nThey could not grasp the mighty spirit she was
Or change by closeness to be
\neven as she.
Some felt her with their souls and thrilled with her;
A
\ngreatness felt near yet beyond mind's grasp;
To see her was a summons to
\nadore,
To be near her drew a high communion's force.
So men worship a god
\ntoo great to know,
Too high, too vast to wear a limiting shape;
They feel
\na Presence and obey a might,
Adore a love whose rapture invades their
\nbreasts;
To a divine ardour quickening the heart-beats,
A law they follow
\ngreatening heart and life.
Opened to a breath is the new diviner air,
\nOpened to man is a freer, happier world:
He sees high steps climbing to Self
\nand Light.
Her divine parts the soul's allegiance called:
It saw, it felt;
\nit knew the deity.
Her will was puissant on their nature's acts,
Her
\nheart's inexhaustible sweetness lured their hearts,
A being they loved whose
\nbounds exceeded theirs;<\/font> <\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page – 16<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nHer measure they could not reach but bore her touch,
Answering with the
\nflower's answer to the sun
They gave themselves to her and asked no more.
\nOne greater than themselves, too wide for their ken,
Their minds could not
\nunderstand nor wholly know,
Their lives replied to hers, moved at her words:
\nThey felt a godhead and obeyed a call,
Answered to her lead and did her work
\nin the world,
Their lives, their natures moved compelled by hers
As if the
\ntruth of their own larger selves
Put on an aspect of divinity
To exalt
\nthem to a pitch beyond their earth's.
They felt a larger future meet their
\nwalk;
She held their hands, she chose for them their paths:
They were
\nmoved by her towards great unknown things,
Faith drew them and the joy to
\nfeel themselves hers;
They lived in her, they saw the world with her eyes.
\nSome turned to her against their nature's bent;
Divided between wonder and
\nrevolt,
Drawn by her charm and mastered by her will,
<\/b>Possessed by
\nher, her striving to possess,
Impatient subjects, their tied longing hearts
\nHugging the bonds close of which they most complained,
Murmured at a yoke
\nthey would have wept to lose,
The splendid yoke of her beauty and her love:
\nOthers pursued her with life's blind desires
And claiming all of her as their
\nlonely own,
Hastened to engross her sweetness meant for all.<\/b>
As
\nearth claims light for its lone separate need,
Demanding her for their sole
\njealous clasp
They asked from her movements bounded like their own
And to
\ntheir smallness craved a like response.
Or they repined that she surpassed
\ntheir grip,
And hoped to bind her close with longing's cords.
Or finding
\nher touch desired too strong to bear
They blamed her for a tyranny they
\nloved,
Shrank into themselves as from too bright a sun,
Yet hankered for
\nthe splendour they refused.
Angrily enamoured other sweet passionate ray
\nThe weakness of their earth could hardly bear,
\n<\/font> <\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page – 17<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nThey longed but cried out at the touch desired
Inapt to meet divinity so
\nclose,
Intolerant of a Force they could not house.
Some drawn unwillingly
\nby her divine sway
Endured it like a sweet but alien spell,
Unable to
\nmount to levels too sublime
They yearned to draw her down to their own earth.
\nOr forced to centre round her their passionate lives
They hoped to bind to
\ntheir heart's human needs
Her glory and grace that had enslaved their souls.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n 
     But mid this world, these hearts
\nthat answered her call,
None could stand up her equal and her mate.
In
\nvain she stooped to equal them with her heights,
Too pure that air was for
\nsmall souls to breathe.
These comrade selves to raise to her own wide
\nbreadths
Her heart desired and fill with her own power
That a diviner
\nForce might enter life,
A breath of Godhead greaten human time.
Although
\nshe leaned down to their littleness
Covering their lives with her strong
\npassionate hands
And knew by sympathy their needs and wants
And dived in
\nthe shallow wave-depths of their lives
And met and shared their heart-beats
\nof grief and joy
And bent to heal their sorrow and their pride,
Lavishing
\nthe might that was hers on her lone peak
To lift to it their aspiration's cry
\nAnd though she drew their souls into her vast
And surrounded with the silence
\nof her deeps
And held as the great Mother holds her own,
Only her earthly
\nsurface bore their charge
And mixed its fire with their mortality:
Her
\ngreater self lived sole, unclaimed, within.
Oftener in dumb Nature's stir and
\npeace
A nearness she could feel serenely one,
The Force in her drew
\nearth's subhuman broods;
And to her spirit's large and free delight
She
\njoined the ardent-hued magnificent lives
Of animal and bird and flower and
\ntree.
They answered to her with the simple heart.<\/font> <\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Page – 18<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nIn man a dim disturbing somewhat lives,
It knows but turns away from divine
\nLight
Preferring the dark ignorance of the fall.
Among the many who came
\ndrawn to her
Nowhere she found her partner of high tasks,
The comrade of
\nher soul, her other self
Who was made with her, like God and Nature, one.
\nSome near approached, were touched, caught fire, then failed.
Too great was
\nher demand, too pure her force.
Thus lighting earth around her like a sun,
\nYet in her inmost sky an orb aloof,
A distance severed her from those most
\ndose.
Puissant, apart her soul as the gods live.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n
     As yet with the great world she had
\nno link;
In a small circle of young eager hearts,
Her spirit's early reign
\nand human school,
Her apprenticeship she made to life and death,
Content
\nin her little garden of the gods
As blossoms a flower in an unvisited place.
\nEarth nursed, unconscious still, the inhabiting flame,
Yet something deeply
\nstirred and dimly knew,
There was a movement and a passionate call,
A
\nrainbow dream, a hope of golden change;
Some secret wing of expectation beat,
\nA growing sense of something new and rare
And beautiful stole across the
\n-heart of Time.
Then a faint whisper of her touched the soil,
Breathed
\nlike a hidden need the soul divines;
The eye of the great world discovered
\nher,
A wonder lifted up its bardic voice.
A key to a Light still kept in
\nbeing's care,
The sun-word of an ancient mystery's sense,
Her name ran
\nmurmuring on the lips of men
Exalted and sweet like an inspired verse
\nStruck from the epic lyre of rumour's winds
Or sung like a chanted thought by
\nthe poet Fame.
But like a sacred symbol's was that cult.
Admired,
\nunsought, intangible to the grasp
Her beauty and flaming strength were seen
\nafar <\/font>\n<\/p>\n

\n
\nPage – 19<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\nLike lightning playing with the fallen day,
A glory unapproachably divine.
\nThere came to join her heart no heart's approach,
No transient earthly love
\nassailed her calm,
No hero passion had the strength to seize,
No eyes
\ndemanded her replying eyes.
A Power within her awed the imperfect flesh;
\nThe self-protecting genius in our clay
Divined the goddess in the woman's
\nshape
And drew back from a touch beyond its kind,
The earth-nature bound
\nin the sense-life's narrow make.
The hearts of men are amorous of clay-kin
\nAnd bear not spirits lone and high who bring
Fire-intimations from the
\ndeathless planes
Too vast for souls not born to mate with heaven.
Whoever
\nis too great must lonely live,"
Adored he walks in mighty solitude;
Vain
\nis his labour to create his kins,
His only comrade is the Strength within.
\nThus was it for a while with Savitri,
All worshipped marvellingly, none dared
\nto claim.
Her mind sat high pouring its golden beams,
Her heart was a
\ncrowded temple of delight.
A single lamp lit in perfection's house,
A
\nbright pure image in a priestless shrine,
Alone amid surrounding crowds she
\ndwelt,
Apart in herself until her hour of fate.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 20<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CANTO TWO   THE GROWTH OF THE FLAME     A LAND of mountains and wide sun-beat plainsAnd giant rivers pacing to vast seas,A field…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-02-savitri-1951","wpcat-73-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3305","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=3305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3305\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}