Once I went to the garden
And found that there were no flowers;
I looked into my watch
But from it had vanished all the hours.
From sky to deeper sky
In search of a home the birds flew;
Although twinkling in night
Depth of the night the stars never knew.
I read many a book
Yet of meaning the words were devoid;
I saw in the nothing
Only strange reasons of nothing employed.
But then I seized the arrow
Whizzing through the vacuous air;
And made it a rushing flame
Who could life's swiftnesses bear.
With a master-key in hand,
Oh to be active eternity! I walk from peak to unseen peak
And claim that many-hued fire for me.
19/06/98 2:21 PM
Page 1
I wait upon thy will in my soul
Be it mystical night or the day, Assured in quiet adoration
Along the quiet unerroneous way.
My heart is full of peace
With nothing, nothing to speak, There is the light that grows
A greater light to seek.
The day broadens and turns
Into thorough gold of the noon, And the night deepens in hush
To be one with the silver moon.
Even my body falls mute
And just sends its silent word, — As if to reach a new richness
Nothing be said, nothing stirred.
The way is not long, nor weary,
When in thee I put all my trust, I have one will and one, —
Indeed what thou wiliest, I must.
20/06/98 2:21 PM
Page 2
I was asleep in a strange new dream
When the dream broke out like an ocean Flowing into a ceaseless sparkling stream
From eve to morn in a quiet complaintless motion.
Peace became dense and serene
And the night-watchers one by one went away To a world of calm, — which would mean
Call of tranquil air would soon herald the day.
Suddenly along the far horizon-line
Ran dewy orange as though it was sure to bring Yester-gold of silence and it combine
With new songs the birds are about to sing.
Since then nothing seems worthless,
Paltry, inconsiderable, and nothing limits sets:
Sky after sky opens to a truer wideness
And I see the speck of dust too as the Infinite's.
21/06/98 10:02 AM
Page 3
I saw a strange new aura around your head That seemed something new to tell,
That the magic of the sky that holds the stars Is coming here soon for ever to dwell.
It will make the streams flow upward, Tend in our hearts fruit-bearing trees;
From the crimson seeds shall spring up again Diamond-loaded branches of ecstasies.
There will be sweet and enchanting voices Not climbing up from the floor of the valley,
But leaning down from the luminous hush Great rhythms ,of truth shaping truth daily.
This is not the charmed Lake of the Forest And no Lady owns the emerald-studded sword,
Yet purity is the one price that must be paid, - Price that comes in purity of the absolute Word.
I have seen in your face's timeless beauty Not only the phases of the growing spirit,
But hauntingly the wonder that wants to be Deathless in the spirit of life that is fire-lit.
21/06/98 3:27 PM r
Page 4
I went to the edge of timelessness To meet the God of Time;
But he was busy making the rounds In seasons of the far-off clime.
But I was keen to meet him some day And waited all the way through
And, perforce as I had to wait, started Thinking of the timeless true.
Someone had told me long back he was Just very indifferent and dull,
That he watched the sun and snow and rain Into sleep himself to lull.
He breathed the least even when awake, And sorrow and sacrifice
Never knew, nor knowledge nor ignorance, That death is love's price.
Even when he was put on the cross of pain Beyond suffering he seemed,
Never was a division mid time and timelessness That it be redeemed.
O the speaking hush, 0 the silent word The moulder and the moulded!
Could ever there be one or two or many, Folded or otherwise unfolded?
But then the God of Time had to arrive Forgetting the bride and the groom
And, before the bell rang at seven forty-five, Rush to the Dining Room.
22/06/98 2:21 PM
Page 5
I must get out of this dreamless sleep
And even in stretches of sand see Bounteous life, I must bring to its need
Gold of joy, bright, painless, free.
I commit hence no trespasses
When I look at the wide blue sky, For disdain to this doleful earth,
To songlessness does it least imply.
O give me the song of Fire
Orange and red in its hue, — For the primal bliss to breathe
As it ought, which is past due.
Out of innocence I must grow, —
But already I am a new-born child And hear echoes of the otherwhere
In my heart that no more is wild.
There come to me from the Far of Song
Swift and rich strains of experience, That more and more I gather them
Calm I stay in their confidence.
O the purity in this birth!
But then I must move yet farther on, — Not only in the star and the glow-worm,
It must be so even in the greyest stone.
This daily death one day must die,
This peculiar and useful violence too, And the singing God of Earth must sing
The song of the hushful and the true.
23/06/98 2:30 PM
Page 6
I have heard many songs in the course of time
But many more songs have remained unheard;
But then there is no end to the course of time
And there are yet wide silent spaces to be stirred.
All these hours must pass like fading dreams
And all the notions of life and its mystery Deepen into sleep that is God's one great gift
Holding in its joy revelation's strange memory.
I am not worried that there were wasted hours
Or that I spoke at times the vernacular of despair, For the unknown, the unseen, is a wondrous hope
And it carries the quiet flame up on the flaming stair.
But the sky there is not a misty or tenuous blue
Nor is my unsung song made of uncertain stuff, Now that the morn of morns, and the day of days,
Has come I tell you the unheard is not the far-off.
I might have lived unlived love for too long,
Cherished feelings that sharpen the points of pain;
But 'tis pain that pushes unhappy things behind, —
To such an extent that love it shall forever gain.
24/06/98 9:02 AM
Page 7
The waves of eternity,
Where do they go, where recede? Do they ride the shoreless sea
Somewhere else to get freed?
Is there a somewhere else for them
To disappear like songs into hush, A poem into which to melt
When the words rush and rush?
I thought the birds would soar
And vanish into upper sky, Pilgrims climb the temple steps
To merge into the greatest I.
But it seems that even in God
There are uncounted manynesses, As though from a splendid blank
Flamed out a myriad presences.
Wave after wave must roll on
Embracing eternity's days, Like birds in their wing-beat
A sky beyond sky yet to raise.
25/06/98 3':46PM
Page 8
"Make life a piece of art, picture, song,
A life of love to be ever true and free," — Said the poet who broke all the laws.
"Even though love be greater than art," said he.
O the famed song that knows no bondage,
A traveller whose footsteps echo everywhere, Echoes of love, of colours of the eve, of thought
That roam and roam with the roaming air!
But is this the end of what he does, the goal
Of his inconstant moods, and of his passions, Dim end of metaphors that carry deep burden
Of hopes and of a thousand frustrations?
But is not love a precious sacrifice,
The bird giving himself utterly to his mate, Even though on the tip of the arrow
Rides the piercing shadow of fate?
O the love of liberty to be an artist!
She is the one who believes in no reason, Who takes wings, dares the unmindful flight
In a sky above mediocrity of the season.
But strange, she demands his surrender!
For only would then she gift her graces, The grace of calm and the grace of song
That need bear no authorial traces.
Page 9
I have become one with the great art
And from regions of peace have come to me Sculpted dreams and stars and auras
In songful wonders to breathe flamingly.
"Make life a piece of art," said the artist.
"But around it put golden liberty's frame;
For, surely, you know how to sing and dance
In splendid freedom of the splendid game."
26/06/98 3:07 PM
Page 10
Nights have come, the scented nights,
And the dreams grow larger than the sky;
They may even be like a universe
Whose vision is the vision of a seeing eye.
And see, what great experiences flourish!
The countless stars blossoming on a tree, Waves surging from nowhere to allwhere,
Surging with the deep emerald of the sea.
Strange it may seem but the birds sing
A quiet song that deepens yet the quiet;
A visible beauty walks in the garden
And a singing mood waits upon the poet.
In such moments all is sweet, fragrant, glad,
In gladness that comes from the wondrous;
Intimate words are prescient and ever true
Telling the pain of death is no more for us.
Such were the nights long ago designed,
Dreaming fondnesses of bright heaven to admit;
For gifts of the nights are the rarest gifts
Of a bright-flaming dream that carries love in it.
27/06/98 2:21 PM
Page 11
Purple-tinged are now the clouds
And purple dreams drift in the night;
They have become songs in the sleep
Singing of purple of the day-bright.
And O why do you say, though true,
That purple life fades away, is brief? Because you see inspiriting purple
Just turn into unpurpled disbelief?
There is no doubt purple blooms
Rarely these days, once in a while, And rarer are the souls who love
The purple, love it with a smile.
Very often the gods snatch it away,
Snatch it for delight of their spouses, Pink-purple bosomed ones to dream
A dream that godly passion arouses.
Give not to it O the charmed purple
But awake it to the trueness of sleep, For the evanescent night has faded
In Purple that has come from Blue Deep.
28/06/98 9:09 AM
Page 12
What was the last word you spoke,
The word that began in the summer But had to run through the whole cycle
To meet its quiet confident drummer?
Surely he had to make things beat
First by bringing to the routine death, And surprise our world with his life,
A life that breathes integral Breath.
But indeed absolute is the love
That lives only in such self-giving;
The first word then is also the last,
Of the sacrifice that is true living.
You will then see the wind is lonely
In a deep hush of the woodland, And the cloud in the sky is calm
Its loaded meaning to understand.
It will tell you of the works of time
Done in the dull clime or else abroad To beget a small flower, to get a song,
And turn them all into works of God.
28/06/98 2:39 PM
Page 13
Every day comes with a new dawn, Dawn of the gorgeous east;
Her beauty can never be gathered In words, in thought the least.
But then it seems the lone aged priest Ringing the temple bell
In green and silent depth of the forest Knows her nature well —
Hears a voice rising from the midnight:
"Comes the queen of the day,
Open wide your spaces for her tread, For her to walk in her way.
"Let your simple heart will in her will, Adoration be the only speech."
Early hues have set him on the move In time the temple to reach.
Now do the birds get up betimely And fill the air with her praises,
And in their tranquil songs recite Glories that are this goddess's.
29/06/98 4:30 PM
Page 14
I looked at the star For the flame that shall ever burn in the heart;
I went to the sea If emerald of its peace to me it would impart.
I turned world-ward But it was pretty busy with the daily no things;
Then a bird disclosed Wherefrom had come its such colourful wings.
A child walked up to me And said in the garden were waiting seven gods;
But the backyard shouted:
"Believe him not, all they are just great frauds."
I glimpsed in the night A swan white and purple richly growing gold;
It looked as though Some trepidant soul suddenly became bold.
In my lifeful trance I saw a radiant woman long ago named Savitri;
The sky became a sun, The sun set afire by love who indeed is but she.
30/06/98 2:21 PM
Page 15
The flock of parrots went northward
To the fields north of imagination;
A coel sang early at morn in the east
From the mango tree east of creation.
The white crane looked at the south,
Of wisdom where lives the ever-wise;
Hornbill preferred to go to the west,
The west of the worldly enterprise.
Then came the sudden kingfisher,
Sudden in the revelation's speed;
The eagle rose to the dauntless sky
Where none can its winging exceed.
The blue-bird nestled in the heart
Deep in the heart of a bright flame;
But deeper yet inside is another,
As if a secret name within a name.
The swan of wide spaceless ether
Flew over the worlds across death;
The orange-breasted bird swept down,
Into birth carrying immortal breath.
01/07/98 8:30 AM
Page 16
O the world of life,
O the world that shouldn't be;
Dull drama of the day
Long night's melancholy.
Maybe dream will awake
And joy ripen into fruit;
But wishes here ride horses
Only themselves to loot.
Lonesome beggars
Roam in small clumsy streets;
Lonesome brown-nosers
Whom every pretender greets.
And Lear in prison,
And someone speaking wise;
But the voice of silence
Silenced by loud shrill cries.
O the time's timeless fool,
Playwright of the mad play;
Grey sketches of life drawn
On the unbaked pots of clay.
Hear the lizard's screech,
Look through the rabbit's eye;
Vengeance's the best, —
For love here nothing can buy.
Page 17
Burn the house, the town,
And hated be the raging fire;
But do it all very nobly,
Indeed on a high noble pyre.
Alas, alas, the great liar!
And so they call him God;
But then take the old broom
And with it make him nod.
This is the naive story
Which has no middle, — Between star and quark
Man's quite the riddle.
02/07/98 3:05 PM
Page 18
A huge glass is placed in the sky And its name is Hubble;
It sees a world born and vanish Just as does a soap bubble.
The dust gathers around nothing To form a cloud, a black hole;
Distances condense into a point And pole joins anti-pole.
Suddenly a star explodes at the edge And rises uncurling smoke;
Yes, there was a fire burning long ago Before time from space broke.
Now great masses are drifting, Drifting no one knows where;
But a red light is sent as a signal To tell what's happening there.
Everything is happening in the Void To create a universe;
Out of strange fluctuations it came To avoid the Void's curse.
03/07/98 2:24 PM
Page 19
Once my expectant soul moved
Through a quiet faery landscape;
Peacocks gave it gorgeous moods,
Enchanted songs a songly shape.
Fragrant arbours there climbed
To yet another sky of blueness;
Sweet were reveries and words
So very true in their trueness.
No fate weighed upon the heart
And clouds drifted in happy rain;
No lash of lightning crackled
And absent was death's pain.
My thoughts were at rest, my trees,
Blossoms, rhymes, full of peace;
In the green and glad aery world
Glad streams flowed to glad seas.
Wondrous though the land of joy
Yet treasured a longing my soul, — Puzzled it saw the veiled face of truth
And asked, "Is there for me a goal?"
04/07/98 3:00 PM
Page 20
How does it matter if I know not the road
And uncertain seem the future, hidden from me? But the road will turn into a journeying faith
And lead me on, step by step, degree by degree.
I had picked up for my long arduous quest
Half-words and half-colours, half-images, Idioms that would tell more than what they are
And reveal meanings through pages and pages.
That wondrous moment had come in half-sleep,
The moment for us in life to inseparably meet;
I had crossed the wearying distances of sight,
At the end of sight a strange half-sight to greet.
Brooding mountains rise above calm summits
As though a sudden sky became a massive blue, — As though fadeless tireless winging of the birds
Itself into the winging of a flame turned anew.
Now I live alone, remembering you in trance,
And in it a mystic monologue constantly I hear;
I know in it I shall meet you again, and again:
A half-seer surely shall see the sun-seeing seer.
05/07/98 9:58 AM
Page 21
I had given you a promise
To meet you at the moon-gate;
Faithfully I kept the word
Till it became pretty late.
Even the slow-drifting dream
Unwaitingly took its leave;
That you wouldn't be there
Least did the moon believe.
You had told me earlier
You would wait and take me To the garden by the stream
In love yours to make me.
But then in the meanwhile
Perhaps something happened;
Only a pale phantom I saw,
As if by fear dampened.
A scarlet shadow floated
On a scarlet stream of time, One of the horrid past
Had committed the crime.
In guise of love he came
As if to kiss your feet;
But in your helpless cry
Admitted self-defeat.
Page 22
An ashen spirit laughed
Where I was to wait;
But how can love be lost,
It asked, at the moon-gate?
Rejoice in a garden where
You see no defeated things;
Yet a round moon is there,
There another gate swings.
05/07/98 3:45 PM
Page 23
What can the poor ball do? —
It's an old man's kick. What can the old man do? —
In his hand an old stick.
With the old stick he walks
To meet the God of Death;
Will the kind God in return
Give him faultless breath?
05/07/98 5:45 PM
Page 24
Freedom is wide as a sky,
True as the pilgrim-heart;
In it is born the high will,
In it the glad life's art.
And if one is on the path
To God, to great Reality, Left is no more a choice, —
From desire one is free.
For all are one substance,
Call it pebble, rock, star;
Sight too then vanishes,
And so do the near and far.
Rains-rainbows have gone,
And there no bell rings;
Nor are there seven tunes
Given to these seven things.
The inner spirit dwells
In loneliness of its peace;
Streams, waterfalls, the past
Seaward rush there to cease.
05/07/98 10:10PM
Page 25
This is the great difference
Between dream and dream, Between the seeking word
And the song of the stream:
Dream growing in sleep,
Which is an ancient cry;
Dream that comes to sleep,
A sight to the seeing eye.
O to take birth again,
O to enflower life's spring! Help hope to be happy,
The sky to wing and wing!
A dream full of peace,
A dream born of fresh dew:
It casts no chill shadow,
It takes hue on blazing hue.
One speaks of silence,
The other comes from it, — Voice of a beating heart
Calm of a flaming spirit.
06/07/98 4:56 PM
Page 26
A breeze of happiness blows over my soul,
Orange-hued dew-wet from vineyards of peace, It carries the music of its gold and green,
The songs of birds and the bright fruits of trees.
Streams flow in the honey of its sweetness,
A vibrant light courses through cell and cell;
My whole being is jubilant, as if a prayer
To the infinite was set ablaze in it to dwell.
What can I say of the intimate touch of this air,
Exuberance that makes the heart leap to the moon? O the love that is the foundation of deathless life,
Spontaneous and true, and splendid like the noon!
There is the secret magic which has disclosed
The wonder that the whole creation is a Flame, — A flame that grows in its own self to be flames,
Everywhere in the awareness a marvellous name.
07/07/98 2:12PM
Page 27
Who mothered your joy,
In what flame of birth? Did it burn in the sky,
Or in the winter hearth?
Or was it a star
Who felt it all right To step into birth
And win more light?
07/07/98 4:10PM
Page 28
"How do you worship god?"
Once I asked a rich man. "A sovereign each day
That I bring in my big van."
I looked at a village boy,
And with a running nose;
But in his folded hands
He brought a big red rose.
07/07/98 5:10PM
Page 29
I may go daily to a temple
Or at eve meditate by a lake;
Yet in the bazaar of wants
Sorrowing purchases I make.
Life full of anguish and pain,
Life held by death, — but why? And night after night the stars
Suffer darkly their fate in the sky?
O the same usual law of life
That only shuts god from man! In buzz and hurry of the world
Happier things fall out of the plan.
I may think of love and song
And of the sleepless fire, Or of the dream that awakes
To the breath of the higher.
But then wisdom matters little
And my gains last not a day;
So I must wait, or walk and walk
The dull and long cheerless way.
Kindle the flame in the heart,
A living gold, say the sages, — A calm bright flame of longing
Ageless through all the ages.
What indeed is most needed
Is a response true and pure, A blemishless sincerity
As the merit of life to endure.
08/07/98 9:10 AM
Page 30
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