To a Hero-Worshipper I My life is then a wasted ereme, My song but idle wind Because you merely find In all this woven wealth of rhyme Harsh figures with harsh music wound, The uncouth voice of gorgeous birds, A ruby carcanet of sound, A cloud of lovely words? I am, you say, no magic-rod, No cry oracular, No swart and ominous star, No Sinai-thunder voicing God, I have no burden to my song, No smouldering word instinct with fire, No spell to chase triumphant wrong, No spirit-sweet desire. Mine is not Byron’s lightning spear, Nor Wordsworth’s lucid strain Nor Shelley’s lyric pain, Nor Keats’, th

Bibliographical NOTE COLLECTED POEMS, Volume 5 in SRI AUROBINDO BIRTH CENTENARY LIBRARY, contains all the poems included in SONGS TO MYRTILLA- 1895, URVASIE-1896, AHANA AND OTHER POEMS -1915, LOVE AND DEATH -1921, BAJI PRABHOU -1932, SIX POEMS -1934, TRANSFORMATION AND OTHER POEMS -1941, POEMS -1941, COLLECTED POEMS AND PLAYS -1942, POEMS PAST AND PRESENT -1946, LAST POEMS - 1952, and MORE POEMS - 1957; also ILION - 1957. A few other poems found among Sri Aurobindo's papers are published here for the first time. All poems published after 1950 are reproduced from manuscripts exactly in the form found there. Translations and plays, even when in poetic form, are not