Meditations on Savitri Book 7 Canto 3


Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Then Savitri surged out of her body’s wall
And stood a little span outside herself.... ||118.11||
At the dim portal of the inner life... ||118.12||
A formidable voice cried from within:
“Back, creature of earth, lest tortured and torn thou die.” ||118.14||
The Serpent of the threshold hissing rose,
And trolls and gnomes and goblins scowled and stared
And wild beast roarings thrilled the blood with fear
And menace muttered in a dangerous tongue. ||118.15||
Unshaken her will pressed on the rigid bars:
Her being entered into the inner worlds. ||118.16||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #1






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Across a perilous border line she passed
Where Life dips into the subconscient dusk
Or struggles from Matter into chaos of mind,
Aswarm with elemental entities
And fluttering shapes of vague half-bodied thought
And crude beginnings of incontinent force.... ||118.19||
This state now threatened, thus she pushed from her. ||118.31||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #2






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Approaching loomed a giant head of Life
Ungoverned by mind or soul, subconscient, vast. ||118.36||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #3






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Then journeying forward through the self’s wide hush
She came into a brilliant ordered Space. ||119.1||
There Life dwelt parked in an armed tranquillity;
A chain was on her strong insurgent heart.... ||119.2||
There one stood forth who bore authority
On an important brow and held a rod;
His sentences savoured the oracle. ||120.7||
Traveller or pilgrim of the inner world, ||120.8||
O aspirant to the perfect way of life,
Here find it; rest from search and live at peace. ||120.9||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #4






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Savitri replied casting into his world
Sight’s deep release, the heart’s questioning inner voice.... ||120.17||
“Happy are they who in this chaos of things,
This coming and going of the feet of Time,
Can find the single Truth, the eternal Law: ||120.19||
Happiest who stand on faith as on a rock. ||120.21||
But I must pass leaving the ended search,
Truth’s rounded outcome firm, immutable
And this harmonic building of world-fact,
This ordered knowledge of apparent things. ||120.22||
Here I can stay not, for I seek my soul.” ||120.23||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #5






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

None answered in that bright contented world.... ||120.24||
But some murmured, passers-by from kindred spheres:
Each by his credo judged the thought she spoke. ||120.25||
Who then is this who knows not that the soul
Is a least gland or a secretion’s fault.... ||120.26||
But others, Nay, it is her spirit she seeks.... ||120.27||
But none has touched its limits or seen its face.... ||120.28||
Another with mystic and unsatisfied eyes
Who loved his slain belief and mourned its death:
“Is there one left who seeks for a Beyond? ||120.31||
Can still the path be found, opened the gate?” ||120.32||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #6






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

So she fared on across her silent self. ||121.1||
To a road she came thronged with an ardent crowd...
Guests from the cavern of the secret soul.... ||121.2||
And Savitri mingling in that glorious crowd, ||121.4||
Longed once to hasten like them to save God’s world... ||121.4||
Outstretching her hands to stay the throng she cried:
“O happy company of luminous gods,
Reveal, who know, the road that I must tread,—
To find the birthplace of the occult Fire
And the deep mansion of my secret soul.” ||121.7||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #7






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

One answered pointing to a silence dim
On a remote extremity of sleep
In some far background of the inner world. ||121.8||
“O Savitri, from thy hidden soul we come.... ||121.9||
Follow the world’s winding highway to its source. ||121.11||
There in the silence few have ever reached,
Thou shalt see the Fire burning on the bare stone
And the deep cavern of thy secret soul.” ||121.12||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #8






Savitri Book 7 Canto 3 - The Entry into the Inner Countries

Then Savitri following the great winding road
Came where it dwindled into a narrow path
Trod only by rare wounded pilgrim-feet. ||121.13||
A few bright forms emerged from unknown depths
And looked at her with calm immortal eyes. ||121.14||
There was no sound to break the brooding hush;
One felt the silent nearness of the soul. ||121.15||



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Book 7 Canto 3 Painting #9