Overhead Poetry

Ape on Fire

Fuelled with forests I come, an ape on fire,

A brown beast burning towards the unbarred Blue,

Fierce brain that feels suddenly the skull blown off,

Blind belly crying to be an abysm of stars!

Helpless with flame that snatches them from earth,

My terrible arms strain reddening in mid-air—

Love that has lost the ecstasy it can grasp,

To embrace the bourneless body of the beyond.

Sri Aurobindo's Comment

"The lines you have sent me no doubt have a remarkable force, especially three or four of them, but I do not know that I can say positively from what level or source they come. Perhaps the Illumined Mind but not purely from that. I would have to wait for more light from that illumined quarter before I could pronounce with a complete certainty."

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