Book SevenThe Book of Yoga Canto One The Joy of Union; The Ordeal of the Foreknowledge of Death and the Heart's Grief Fate followed her foreseen immutable road. Man's hopes and longings build the journeying wheels That bear the body of his destiny And lead his blind will towards an unknown goal. His fate within him shapes his acts and rules; Its face and form already are born in him, Its parentage is in his secret soul; Here Matter seems to mould the body's life And the soul follows where its nature drives: Nature and Fate compel his free-will's choice. But greater spirits this balance can reverse And ma

Letters on “Savitri” 1 There is a previous draft, the result of the many retouchings of which somebody told you; but in that form it would not have been a "magnum opus" at all. Besides, it would have been a legend and not a symbol. I therefore started recasting the whole thing; only the best passages and lines of the old draft will remain, altered so as to fit into the new frame. No, I do not work at the poem once a week; I have other things to do. Once a month perhaps, I look at the new form of the first book and make such changes as inspiration points out to me — so that nothing shall fall below the minimum height which I have fixed for it. —1931

Envoi Ite hillc, Camenae, vos quoque ite jam, sane Dulces Camenae, nam fatebimur verum Dulces fuistis, et tamen meas chartas Revisitote sed pudenter et raro. Pale poems, weak and few, who vainly use Your wings towards the unattainable spheres, Offspring of the divine Hellenic Muse, Poor maimèd children born of six disastrous years! Not as your mother’s is your wounded grace, Since not to me with equal love returned The hope which drew me to that serene face Wherein no unreposeful light of effort burned. Depart and live for seasons many or few If live you may, but stay not here to pain My heart with hopeless passion and

The Meditations of Mandavya ONE O joy of gaining all the soul’s desire! O stranger joy of the defeat and loss! O heart that yearnest to uplift the world! O fiercer heart that bendest o’er its pain And drinkst the savour! I will love thee, O Love, Naked or veiled or dreadfully disguised; Not only when thou flatterest my heart But when thou tearst it! Thy sweet pity I love And mother’s care for creatures, for the joys I love thee that the lives of things possess, And love thee for the torment of our pains; Nor cry, as some, against thy will, nor say, Thou art not. Easy is the love that lasts Only

-61_“I”.htm “I” This strutting “I” of human self and pride Is a puppet built by Nature for her use, And dances as her strong compulsions bid, Forcefully feeble, brilliantly obtuse. Our thinking is her leap of fluttering mind, We hear and see by her constructed sense; Our force is hers; her colours have combined Our fly-upon-the-wheel magnificence. He sits within who turns on her machine These beings, portions of his mystery, Many dwarf beams of his great calm sunshine, A reflex of his sole infinity. One mighty Self of cosmic act and thought Employs this figure of a unit nought. Omnipresence He is in me,

NOTES THE BIRD OF FIRE AND TRANCE These two poems are in the nature of metrical experiments. The first is a kind of compromise between the stress system and the foot measure. The stanza is of four lines, alternately of twelve and ten stresses. The second and fourth line in each stanza can be read as a ten-foot line of mixed iambs and anapaests, the first and third, though a similar system subject to replacement of a foot anywhere by a single-syllable half-foot could be applied, are still mainly readable by stresses. The other poem is an experiment in the use of quantitative foot measures. It is a four-line stanza reading alternately ˘ ¯ ˘ | ˘ ¯ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ¯ | ¯ ¯ ˘ | ˘ ¯ ¯

Hic Jacet GLASNEVIN CEMETERY Patriots, behold your guerdon. This man found Erin, his mother, bleeding, chastised, bound, Naked to imputation, poor, denied, While alien masters held her house of pride. And now behold her! Terrible and fair With the eternal ivy in her hair, Armed with the clamorous thunder, how she stands Like Pallas’ self, the Gorgon in her hands. True that her puissance will be easily past, The vision ended; she herself has cast Her fate behind her: yet the work not vain Since that which once has been may be again, And she this image yet recover, fired With godlike workings, brain and hands inspired,

VII METRICAL EXPERIMENTS Winged with dangerous deity, Passion swift and implacable Arose and, storm-footed In the dim heart of him, Ran, insatiate, conquering, Worlds devouring and hearts of men, Then perished, broken by The irresistible Occult masters of destiny,- They who sit in the secrecy And watch unmoved ever Unto the end of all. Metrical Scheme: ¯ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ˘ | ¯ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ˘ | ˘ ¯ | ˘ ¯ | ˘ ˘ | ˘ ˘ ˘ | ¯ ˘ ˘ |

Urvasie CANTO I Pururavus from Titan conflict ceased Turned worldwards, through illimitable space Had travelled like a star ’twixt earth and heaven Slowly and brightly. Late our mortal air He breathed; for downward now the hooves divine Trampling out fire with sound before them went, And the great earth rushed up towards him, green. With the first line of dawn he touched the peaks, Nor paused upon those savage heights, but reached Inferior summits subject to the rain, And rested. Looking northwards thence he saw The giant snows upclimbing to the sky, And felt the mighty silence. In his ear The noise of a retreating bat

KHALED OF THE SEA An Arabic Romance An early work, conceived in twelve cantos with a Prologue and Epilogue, found unrevised and incomplete. Prologue Alnuman and the Peri Canto 1 The Story of Alnuman and the Emir Canto 2 The Companions of Alnuman 1 Canto 3 The Companions of Alnuman 2 Canto 4 The Companions of Alnuman 3 Canto 5 The First Quest of the Sapphire Crown Canto 6 The Quest of the- Golden Snake Canto 7 The Quest of the Marble Queen Canto 8 The Quest of the Snowbird Canto 9 The Second Quest of the Sapphire Crown Canto 10 The Journey of the Green Oasis