I CONSUMMATION Immortal overhead the gold expanse— An ultimate crown of joy's infinity. But a king-power must grip all passion numb And a gigantic loneliness draw down The large gold throbbing on a silver hush. Nought save an ice-pure peak of trance can bear The benediction of that aureole. Sri Aurobindo's Comment "It is very fine—it is the Higher Mind vision and movement throughout, except that in the fifth line a flash of Illumination comes through. Intense light-play and colour in this kind of utterance is usually the Illumined Mind's intervention." In the first version submitted, the second line had

SRI AUROBINDO All heaven's secrecy lit to one face Crowning with calm the body's blinded cry— A soul of upright splendour like the noon. But only shadowless love can breathe this pure Sun-blossom fragrant with eternity— Eagles of rapture lifting flickerless A golden trance wide-winged on golden air. Sri Aurobindo's Comment "It comes from the higher mind except for the fourth and eighth lines which have illumination and are very fine." Page-23

THE DIVINE DENIER Wanderer of hell's chimerical abyss, Dreaming for ever of star-fragrance blown From the efflorescent heart of the Unknown! They knew thee not who scorned thy madnesses, Nor plumbed the beauty of that terrible mood Which hailed as a supreme apocalypse The all-desiring and all-quenching lips Of death's unfathomable solitude! Thou wert Heaven's most God-haunted enemy. The universe to thee was one vast tomb, But of so tense, ineffable a gloom That thou stoodst drunk with measureless mystery, Ecstatic in the very shadow of doom As though an infinite sun had blinded thee! Page-71

2 PRELUDE O Fire divine, make this great marvel pass, That some pure image of thy shadowless will May float within my song's enchanted glass! Sweep over my breath of dream thy mystic mood, O Dragon-bird whose golden harmonies fill With rays of rapture all infinitude!... Or else by unexplorable magic rouse The distance of a superhuman drowse, A paradisal vast of love unknown, That even through a nakedness of night My heart may feel the puissance of thy light, The blinding lustre of a measureless sun! Sri Aurobindo's Comment "Very fine—language and rhythm remarkably harmonious, teres tot-usque

GULFS OF NIGHT From hills inaureoled by a twilight trance, Arms eager with the enchanted cry of love Strain towards a mountain lost in timeless dawn. But how shall arms of reverie clasp that fire When gulfs of nameless night—a dragon's mouth— Have stretched below their blinded centuries?... O paradise-haunted pilgrims of the dusk, Nothing save fall can bare the soul's rich deep. To the emperor height take tributary hands Full of wide wounds like rubies proud and warm, Cut from life's inmost core of mystery. No rapture—till you appease with diamond tears Truth's spirit throne of dross-consuming gold. Sri Au

NOCTURNE My words would bring through atmospheres of calm The new moon's smile that breathes unto the heart Secrets of love lost in clay-captured kisses; The evening star like some great bird whose fury Dies to a cold miraculous sudden pause— Wings buoyed by sheer forgetfulness of earth; And oh that dream-nostalgia in the air, The sky-remembrance of dew-perfumed dust! I would disclose the one ethereal beauty Calling across lone fires and fragrances— But vain were music, vain all light of rapture That drew not sense a pathway to strange sleep Nor woke a passion billowing through the body In search of realms no eye-boat

AGNI JATAVEDAS (In the Rigveda, Agni, called "Jatavedas" or "Knower of births", is the divine Fire visioned in various occult forms as the secret urge of our evolution towards the perfect splendour that is the Spirit.) O smile of heaven locked in a seed of light— O music burning through the heart's dumb rock— O beast of beauty with the golden beard— O lust-consumer in the virgin's bed— Come with thy myriad eyes that face all truth, Thy myriad arms equal to each desire! Shatter or save, but fill this gap of gloom: Rise from below and call thy far wealth down— A straining supplicant of naked silver, A jar of dream,

GREEN TIGER There is no going to the Gold Save on four feet Of the Green Tiger in whose heart's hold Is the ineffable heat. Raw with a burning body Ruled by no thought— Hero of the huge head roaring Ever to be caught! Backward and forward he struggles, Till Sun and Moon tame By cutting his neck asunder: Then the heart's flame Is free and the blind gap brings A new life's beat— Red Dragon with eagle-wings Yet tiger-feet! Time's blood is sap between God's flower, God's root— Infinity waits but to crown This Super-brute. Sri Aurobindo's Comment

WORLD-POET With song on radiant song I clasp the world, +Weaving its wonder and wideness into my heart— But ever the music misses some huge star Or else some flower too small for the minstrel hand. No skill can turn all life my harmony. Perchance a tablet of magic mood will make The truth of the whole universe write itself But only when with mortal thoughts in-drawn I learn the secret time-transcending art: +Silence that, losing all, grows infinite Self ... Sri Aurobindo's Reply "The +marking indicates lines which are of the first poetic order. The ordinary mark indicates those which are excellent. The other lines not marked are

SKY-RIMS As each gigantic vision of sky-rim Preludes yet stranger spaces of the sea, For those who dare the rapturous wave-whim Of soul's uncharted trance-profundity There is no end to God-horizonry: A wideness ever new awaits behind Each ample sweep of plumbless harmony Circling with vistaed gloriole the mind. For the Divine is no fixed paradise, But truth beyond great truth—a spirit-heave From unimaginable sun-surprise Of beauty to immense love-lunar eve, Dreaming through lone sidereal silence on To yet another alchemy of dawn! The first version had for its last line: To yet another revelatory dawn