The Winds of Wonder

Apropos of Two Vast Negations — 17

Earth-nature cannot rise to the celestial levels

Transfigured Death, the godhead of the vision wonderful, does not see the possibility of earth-nature and man’s nature rising to the celestial levels, they yet abiding earth. True, sometimes heaven-light does visit the earth even as there is the All-Truth and there is the timeless bliss:

But hers are fragments of a star-lost gleam,

Hers are but careless visits of the gods. ||152.7||

Heaven’s call is rare, rarer the heart that heeds; ||152.13||

My will, my call is there in men and things;

But the Inconscient lies at the world’s grey back

And draws to its breast of Night and Death and Sleep. ||152.19||

How shall he see with the Omniscient’s eyes,

How shall he will with the Omnipotent’s force? ||152.25||

O too compassionate and eager Dawn,

Leave to the circling aeons’ tardy pace

And to the working of the inconscient Will,

Leave to its imperfect light the earthly race:

All shall be done by the long act of Time. ||152.26||

O Flame, withdraw into thy luminous self

Or else return to thy original might

On a seer-summit above thought and world;

Partner of my unhoured eternity,

Be one with the infinity of my power:

For thou art the World Mother and the Bride. ||152.28||

Break into eternity thy mortal mould;

Melt, Lightning, into thy invisible flame. ||152.33||

Clasp, Ocean, deep into thyself thy wave,

Happy for ever in the embosoming surge. ||152.34||

Grow one with the still passion of the depths,

Then shalt thou know the Lover and the Loved,

Leaving the limits dividing him and thee. ||152.35||

Receive him into boundless Savitri,

Lose thyself into infinite Satyavan,

O miracle where thou beganst there cease! ||152.36||

Savitri to the radiant God

Savitri dismisses this advice, not falling prey to the temptation.

In vain thou temptst with solitary bliss

Two spirits saved out of a suffering world;

My soul and his indissolubly linked

In the one task for which our lives were born

To raise the world to God in deathless Light,

To bring God down to the world on earth we came,

To change the earthly life to life divine. ||153.1||

I keep my will to save the world and man;

Even the charm of thy alluring voice,

O blissful godhead, cannot seize and snare. ||153.2||

I sacrifice not earth to happier worlds. ||153.3||

Because there dwelt the Eternal’s vast Idea

And his dynamic will in men and things,

So only could the enormous scene begin. ||153.4||

Since God has made earth, earth must make in her God;

I claim thee for the world that thou hast made. ||153.10||

I have felt a secret spirit stir in things

Carrying the body of the growing God:

It looks through veiling forms at veilless truth,

It pushes back the curtain of the gods,

It climbs towards its own eternity. ||153.13||

But the god answered

Savitri is acknowledged ad the incarnate Word by which supreme realites are expressed and realised. She is the vision and the voice of the Supreme, the knowledge too. But she should not dare to do things too soon.

O living power of the incarnate Word,

All that the Spirit has dreamed thou canst create:

Thou art the force by which I made the worlds,

Thou art my vision and my will and voice. ||153.14||

But knowledge too is thine, the world-plan thou knowest

And the tardy process of the pace of Time. ||153.15||

In the impetuous drive of thy heart of flame,

In thy passion to deliver man and earth,

Indignant at the impediments of Time

And the slow evolution’s sluggard steps,

Lead not the spirit in an ignorant world

To dare too soon the adventure of the Light, …

Into the danger of the Infinite. ||153.16||

But if thou wilt not wait for Time and God,

Do then thy work and force thy will on Fate. ||153.17||

As I have taken from thee my load of night

And taken from thee my twilight’s doubts and dreams,

So now I take my light of utter Day. ||153.18||

These are my symbol kingdoms but not here

Can the great choice be made that fixes fate

Or uttered the sanction of the Voice supreme. ||153.19||

Arise upon a ladder of greater worlds

To the infinity where no world can be. ||153.20||

Two are the Powers that hold the ends of Time;

Spirit foresees, Matter unfolds its thought, … ||153.23||

If thou must indeed deliver man and earth

On the spiritual heights, look down on life,

Discover the truth of God and man and world;

Then do thy task knowing and seeing all. ||153.25||

Ascend, O soul, into thy timeless self;

Choose destiny’s curve and stamp thy will on Time. ||153.26||

Savitri is given choices for acceptance

He ended and Savitri in an ineffable world lived fulfilled. An energy of the triune Infinite, in a measureless Reality she dwelt. Cried a voice unheard by ears:

“Choose, spirit, thy supreme choice not given again;

For now from my highest being looks at thee

The nameless formless peace where all things rest. ||153.36||

Accept, O music, weariness of thy notes,

O stream, wide breaking of thy channel banks.” ||153.38||

But someone yearned within a bosom unknown. ||153.40||

And silently the woman’s heart replied:

“Thy peace, O Lord, a boon within to keep

Amid the roar and ruin of wild Time

For the magnificent soul of man on earth. ||153.41||

Thy calm, O Lord, that bears thy hands of joy.” ||153.42||

Limitless like ocean round a lonely isle

A second time the eternal cry arose:

“Wide open are the ineffable gates in front. ||153.43||

My spirit leans down to break the knot of earth,

Amorous of oneness without thought or sign

To cast down wall and fence, to strip heaven bare,

See with the large eye of infinity,

Unweave the stars and into silence pass.” ||153.44||

Through the tremendous stillness of her thoughts

Immeasurably the woman’s nature spoke:

“Thy oneness, Lord, in many approaching hearts,

My sweet infinity of thy numberless souls.” ||153.46||

A third time swelled the great admonishing call:

“I spread abroad the refuge of my wings. ||153.47||

Out of its incommunicable deeps

My power looks forth of mightiest splendour, stilled

Into its majesty of sleep, withdrawn

Above the dreadful whirlings of the world.” ||153.48||

And passionately the woman’s heart replied:

“Thy energy, Lord, to seize on woman and man,

To take all things and creatures in their grief

And gather them into a mother’s arms.” ||153.49||

A last great time the warning sound was heard:

“I open the wide eye of solitude

To uncover the voiceless rapture of my bliss,

Where in a pure and exquisite hush it lies

Motionless in its slumber of ecstasy,

Resting from the sweet madness of the dance

Out of whose beat the throb of hearts was borne.” ||153.50||

Then all the woman yearningly replied:

“Thy embrace which rends the living knot of pain,

Thy joy, O Lord, in which all creatures breathe,

Thy magic flowing waters of deep love,

Thy sweetness give to me for earth and men.” ||153.51||