The Secret Splendour

Two are the mystic makers of earth's life.

Their passion is for ever and their joy

is the breaking forth of the hidden truth of time.

But while the ages sing out of their lips

The eyes are lost beyond both life and love:

Like hierophants feeding a temple fire

With silent sweetnesses of sandalwood,

They offer the two rapturous bodies and breaths

To a single sun of omnipresent mind

That knows all by sheer sense of its own gold.

This glory keeps the lovers statue-pure;

An absolute hush in an eternal poise

Contains the keen creative ecstasy—

No hunger runs from face to shining face,

No lust quivers in the heart-revealing touch:

Here is not union of fragmented flesh

Nor strife to merge divided dreams: the Alone

Magically quaffs the nectar of being twain!

Ever a shadowless identity

With no call even for tiniest flicker of a kiss,

These two have joined with lackless souls for a new

Burst of the deep self-light in which they are one.

28.7.48

Page 349