271

THROUGH the sadness of all things I hear the crooning of the Eternal Mother.

272

I CAME to your shore as a stranger, I lived in your house as a guest, I leave your door as a friend, my earth.

273

LET my thoughts come to you, when I am gone, like the afterglow of sunset at the margin of starry silence.

274

LIGHT in my heart the evening star of rest and then let the night whisper to me of love.

275

I AM a child in the dark.

I stretch my hands through the coverlet of night for thee, Mother.

276

THE day of work is done. Hide my face in your arms, Mother.

Let me dream.

277

THE lamp of meeting burns long; it goes out in a moment at the parting.

278

ONE word keep for me in thy silence, O World, when I am dead, "I have loved."

279

WE live in this world when we love it.

280

LET the dead have the immortality of fame, but the living the immortality of love.

281

I HAVE seen thee as the half-awakened child sees his mother in the dusk of the dawn and then smiles and sleeps again.

282

I SHALL die again and again to know that life is inexhaustible.

283

WHILE I was passing with the crowd in the road I saw thy smile from the balcony and I sang and forgot all noise.

284

LOVE is life in its fulness like the cup with its wine.

285

THEY light their own lamps and sing their own words in their temples.

But the birds sing thy name in thine own morning light,--for thy name is joy.

286

LEAD me in the centre of thy silence to fill my heart with songs.

287

LET them live who choose in their own hissing world of fireworks.

My heart longs for thy stars, my God.

288

LOVE'S pain sang round my life like the unplumbed sea, and love's joy sang like birds in its flowering groves.

289

PUT out the lamp when thou wishest.

I shall know thy darkness and shall love it.

290

WHEN I stand before thee at the day's end thou shalt see my scars and know that I had my wounds and also my healing.

291

SOME day I shall sing to thee in the sunrise of some other world, "I have seen thee before in the light of the earth, in the love of man."

292

CLOUDS come floating into my life from other days no longer to shed rain or usher storm but to give colour to my sunset sky.

293

TRUTH raises against itself the storm that scatters its seeds broadcast.

294

THE storm of the last night has crowned this morning with golden peace.

295

TRUTH seems to come with its final word; and the final word gives birth to its next.

296

BLESSED is he whose fame does not outshine his truth.

297

SWEETNESS of thy name fills my heart when I forget mine--like thy morning sun when the mist is melted.

298

THE silent night has the beauty of the mother and the clamorous day of the child.

299

THE world loved man when he smiled. The world became afraid of him when he laughed.

300

GOD waits for man to regain his childhood in wisdom.

301

LET me feel this world as thy love taking form, then my love will help it.

302

THY sunshine smiles upon the winter days of my heart, never doubting of its spring flowers.

303

GOD kisses the finite in his love and man the infinite.

304

THOU crossest desert lands of barren years to reach the moment of fulfilment.

305

GOD's silence ripens man's thoughts into speech.

306

THOU wilt find, Eternal Traveller, marks of thy footsteps across my songs.

307

LET me not shame thee, Father, who displayest thy glory in thy children.

308

CHEERLESS is the day, the light under frowning clouds is like a punished child with traces of tears on its pale cheeks, and the cry of the wind is like the cry of a wounded world. But I know I am travelling to meet my Friend.

309

TO-NIGHT there is a stir among the palm leaves, a swell in the sea, Full Moon, like the heart throb of the world. From what unknown sky hast thou carried in thy silence the aching secret of love?

310

I DREAM of a star, an island of light, where I shall be born and in the depth of its quickening leisure my life will ripen its works like the ricefield in the autumn sun.

311

THE smell of the wet earth in the rain rises like a great chant of praise from the voiceless multitude of the insignificant.

312

THAT love can ever lose is a fact that we cannot accept as truth.

313

WE shall know some day that death can never rob us of that which our soul has gained, for her gains are one with herself.

314

GOD comes to me in the dusk of my evening with the flowers from my past kept fresh in his basket.

315

WHEN all the strings of my life will be tuned, my Master, then at every touch of thine will come out the music of love.

316

LET me live truly, my Lord, so that death to me become true.

317

MAN'S history is waiting in patience for the triumph of the insulted man.

318

I FEEL thy gaze upon my heart this moment like the sunny silence of the morning upon the lonely field whose harvest is over.

319

I LONG for the Island of Songs across this heaving Sea of Shouts.

320

THE prelude of the night is commenced in the music of the sunset, in its solemn hymn to the ineffable dark.

321

I HAVE scaled the peak and found no shelter in fame's bleak and barren height. Lead me, my Guide, before the light fades, into the valley of quiet where life's harvest mellows into golden wisdom.

322

THINGS look phantastic in this dimness of the dusk--the spires whose bases are lost in the dark and tree tops like blots of ink. I shall wait for the morning and wake up to see thy city in the light.

323

I HAVE suffered and despaired and known death and I am glad that I am in this great world.

324

THERE are tracts in my life that are bare and silent. They are the open spaces where my busy days had their light and air.

325

RELEASE me from my unfulfilled past clinging to me from behind making death difficult.

326

LET this be my last word, that I trust in thy love.

1


SERVANT.  Have mercy upon your servant, my queen!

QUEEN.  The assembly is over and my servants are all gone.  Why
  do you come at this late hour?

SERVANT.  When you have finished with others, that is my time.
I come to ask what remains for your last servant to do.

QUEEN.  What can you expect when it is too late?

SERVANT.  Make me the gardener of your flower garden.

QUEEN.  What folly is this?

SERVANT.  I will give up my other work.
I will throw my swords and lances down in the dust.  Do not send
  me to distant courts; do not bid me undertake new conquests.
  But make me the gardener of your flower garden.

QUEEN.  What will your duties be?

SERVANT.  The service of your idle days.
I will keep fresh the grassy path where you walk in the morning,
  where your feet will be greeted with praise at every step by
  the flowers eager for death.
I will swing you in a swing among the branches of the
  _saptaparna_, where the early evening moon will struggle
  to kiss your skirt through the leaves.
I will replenish with scented oil the lamp that burns by your
  bedside, and decorate your footstool with sandal and saffron
  paste in wondrous designs.

QUEEN.  What will you have for your reward?

SERVANT.  To be allowed to hold your little fists like tender
  lotus-buds and slip flower chains over your wrists; to tinge
  the soles of your feet with the red juice of _ashoka_
  petals and kiss away the speck of dust that may chance to
  linger there.

QUEEN.  Your prayers are granted, my servant, you will be the
  gardener of my flower garden.

2


"Ah, poet, the evening draws near; your hair is turning grey.
"Do you in your lonely musing hear the message of the hereafter?"

"It is evening," the poet said, "and I am listening because some
  one may call from the village, late though it be.
"I watch if young straying hearts meet together, and two pairs of
  eager eyes beg for music to break their silence and speak for
  them.
"Who is there to weave their passionate songs, if I sit on the
  shore of life and contemplate death and the beyond?

"The early evening star disappears.
"The glow of a funeral pyre slowly dies by the silent river.
"Jackals cry in chorus from the courtyard of the deserted house
  in the light of the worn-out moon.
"If some wanderer, leaving home, come here to watch the night and
  with bowed head listen to the murmur of the darkness, who is
  there to whisper the secrets of life into his ears if I,
  shutting my doors, should try to free myself from mortal bonds?

"It is a trifle that my hair is turning grey.
"I am ever as young or as old as the youngest and the oldest of
  this village.
"Some have smiles, sweet and simple, and some a sly twinkle in
  their eyes.
"Some have tears that well up in the daylight, and others tears
  that are hidden in the gloom.
They all have need for me, and I have no time to brood over the
  afterlife.
"I am of an age with each, what matter if my hair turns grey?"

3


In the morning I cast my net into the sea.
I dragged up from the dark abyss things of strange aspect and
  strange beauty--some shone like a smile, some glistened like
  tears, and some were flushed like the cheeks of a bride.
When with the day's burden I went home, my love was sitting in
  the garden idly tearing the leaves of a flower.
I hesitated for a moment, and then placed at her feet all that I
  had dragged up, and stood silent.
She glanced at them and said, "What strange things are these?  I
  know not of what use they are!"
I bowed my head in shame and thought, "I have not fought for
  these, I did not buy them in the market; they are not fit gifts
  for her."
Then the whole night through I flung them one by one into the
  street.
In the morning travellers came; they picked them up and carried
  them into far countries.

4


Ah me, why did they build my house by the road to the market
  town?
They moor their laden boats near my trees.
They come and go and wander at their will.
I sit and watch them; my time wears on.
Turn them away I cannot.  And thus my days pass by.

Night and day their steps sound by my door.
Vainly I cry, "I do not know you."
Some of them are known to my fingers, some to my nostrils, the
  blood in my veins seems to know them, and some are known to my
  dreams.
Turn them away I cannot.  I call them and say, "Come to my house
  whoever chooses.  Yes, come."

In the morning the bell rings in the temple.
They come with their baskets in their hands.
Their feet are rosy red.  The early light of dawn is on their
  faces.
Turn them away I cannot.  I call them and I say, "Come to my
  garden to gather flowers.  Come hither."

In the mid-day the gong sounds at the palace gate.
I know not why they leave their work and linger near my hedge.
The flowers in their hair are pale and faded; the notes are
  languid in their flutes.
Turn them away I cannot.  I call them and say, "The shade is cool
  under my trees.  Come, friends."

At night the crickets chirp in the woods.
Who is it that comes slowly to my door and gently knocks?
I vaguely see the face, not a word is spoken, the stillness of
  the sky is all around.
Turn away my silent guest I cannot.  I look at the face through
  the dark, and hours of dreams pass by.

5


I am restless.  I am athirst for far-away things.
My soul goes out in a longing to touch the skirt of the dim
  distance.
O Great Beyond, O the keen call of thy flute!
I forget, I ever forget, that I have no wings to fly, that I am
  bound in this spot evermore.

I am eager and wakeful, I am a stranger in a strange land.
Thy breath comes to me whispering an impossible hope.
Thy tongue is known to my heart as its very own.
O Far-to-seek, O the keen call of thy flute!
I forget, I ever forget, that I know not the way, that I have not
  the winged horse.

I am listless, I am a wanderer in my heart.
In the sunny haze of the languid hours, what vast vision of thine
  takes shape in the blue of the sky!
O Farthest end, O the keen call of thy flute!
I forget, I ever forget, that the gates are shut everywhere in
  the house where I dwell alone!

6


The tame bird was in a cage, the free bird was in the forest.
They met when the time came, it was a decree of fate.
The free bird cries, "O my love, let us fly to wood."
The cage bird whispers, "Come hither, let us both live in the
  cage."
Says the free bird, "Among bars, where is there room to spread
  one's wings?"
"Alas," cries the cage bird, "I should not know where to sit
  perched in the sky."

The free bird cries, "My darling, sing the songs of the
  woodlands."
The cage bird says, "Sit by my side, I'll teach you the speech of
  the learned."
The forest bird cries, "No, ah no! songs can never be taught."
The cage bird says, "Alas for me, I know not the songs of the
  woodlands."

Their love is intense with longing, but they never can fly wing
  to wing.
Through the bars of the cage they look, and vain is their wish to
  know each other.
They flutter their wings in yearning, and sing, "Come closer, my
  love!"
The free bird cries, "It cannot be, I fear the closed doors of
  the cage."
The cage bird whispers, "Alas, my wings are powerless and dead."

7


O mother, the young Prince is to pass by our door,--how can I
  attend to my work this morning?
Show me how to braid up my hair; tell me what garment to put on.
Why do you look at me amazed, mother?
I know well he will not glance up once at my window; I know he
  will pass out of my sight in the twinkling of an eye; only the
  vanishing strain of the flute will come sobbing to me from
  afar.
But the young Prince will pass by our door, and I will put on my
  best for the moment.

O mother, the young Prince did pass by our door, and the morning
  sun flashed from his chariot.
I swept aside the veil from my face, I tore the ruby chain from
  my neck and flung it in his path.
Why do you look at me amazed, mother?
I know well he did not pick up my chain; I know it was crushed
  under his wheels leaving a red stain upon the dust, and no one
  knows what my gift was nor to whom.
But the young Prince did pass by our door, and I flung the jewel
  from my breast before his path.