LI
I KNOW that at the dim end of some day the sun will bid me its farewell.
Shepherds will play their pipes beneath the banyan trees, and cattle graze on the slope by the river, while my days will pass into the dark.
This is my prayer, that I may know before I leave why the earth called me to her arms.
Why her night's silence spoke to me of stars, and her daylight kissed my thoughts into flower.
Before I go may I linger over my last refrain, completing its music, may the lamp be lit to see your face and the wreath woven to crown you.
LII
WHAT music is that in whose measure the world is rocked?
We laugh when it beats upon the crest of life, we shrink in terror when it returns into the dark.
But the play is the same that comes and goes with the rhythm of the endless music.
You hide your treasure in the palm of your hand, and we cry that we are robbed.
But open and shut your palm as you will, the gain and the loss are the same.
At the game you play with your own self you lose and win at once.
LIII
I HAVE kissed this world with my eyes and my limbs; I have wrapt it within my heart in numberless folds; I have flooded its days and nights with thoughts till the world and my life have grown one,--and I love my life because I love the light of the sky so enwoven with me.
If to leave this world be as real as to love it--then there must be a meaning in the meeting and the parting of life.
If that love were deceived in death, then the canker of this deceit would eat into all things, and the stars would shrivel and grow black.
LIV
THE Cloud said to me, "I vanish"; the Night said, "I plunge into the fiery dawn."
The Pain said, "I remain in deep silence as his footprint."
"I die into the fulness," said my life to me.
The Earth said, "My lights kiss your thoughts every moment."
"The days pass," Love said, "but I wait for you."
Death said, "I ply the boat of your life across the sea."
LV
TULSIDAS, the poet, was wandering, deep in thought, by the Ganges, in that lonely spot where they burn their dead.
He found a woman sitting at the feet of the corpse of her dead husband, gaily dressed as for a wedding.
She rose as she saw him, bowed to him, and said, "Permit me, Master, with your blessing, to follow my husband to heaven."
"Why such hurry, my daughter?" asked Tulsidas. "Is not this earth also His who made heaven?"
"For heaven I do not long," said the woman. "I want my husband."
Tulsidas smiled and said to her, "Go back to your home, my child. Before the month is over you will find your husband."
The woman went back with glad hope. Tulsidas came to her every day and gave her high thoughts to think, till her heart was filled to the brim with divine love.
When the month was scarcely over, her neighbours came to her, asking, "Woman, have you found your husband?"
The widow smiled and said, "I have."
Eagerly they asked, "Where is he?"
"In my heart is my lord, one with me," said the woman.
LVI
You came for a moment to my side and touched me with the great mystery of the woman that there is in the heart of creation.
She who is ever returning to God his own outflo wing of sweetness; she is the ever fresh beauty and youth in nature; she dances in the bubbling streams and sings in the morning light; she with heaving waves suckles the thirsty earth; in her the Eternal One breaks in two in a joy that no longer may contain itself, and overflows in the pain of love.
LVII
WHO is she who dwells in my heart, the woman forlorn for ever?
I wooed her and I failed to win her. I decked her with wreaths and sang in her praise.
A smile shone in her face for a moment, then it faded.
"I have no joy in thee," she cried, the woman in sorrow.
I bought her jewelled anklets and fanned her with a fan gem-studded; I made her a bed on a bedstead of gold.
There flickered a gleam of gladness in her eyes, then it died.
"I have no joy in these," she cried, the woman in sorrow.
I seated her upon a car of triumph and drove her from end to end of the earth.
Conquered hearts bowed down at her feet, and shouts of applause rang in the sky.
Pride shone in her eyes for a moment, then it was dimmed in tears.
"I have no joy in conquest," she cried, the woman in sorrow.
I asked her, "Tell me whom do you seek?"
She only said, "I wait for him of the unknown name."
Days pass by and she cries, "When will my beloved come whom I know not, and be known to me for ever?"
LVIII
YOURS is the light that breaks forth from the dark, and the good that sprouts from the cleft heart of strife.
Yours is the house that opens upon the world, and the love that calls to the battlefield.
Yours is the gift that still is a gain when everything is a loss, and the life that flows through the caverns of death.
Yours is the heaven that lies in the common dust, and you are there for me, you are there for all.
LIX
WHEN the weariness of the road is upon me, and the thirst of the sultry day; when the ghostly hours of the dusk throw their shadows across my life, then I cry not for your voice only, my friend, but for your touch.
There is an anguish in my heart for the burden of its riches not given to you.
Put out your hand through the night, let me hold it and fill it and keep it; let me feel its touch along the lengthening stretch of my loneliness.
LX
THE odour cries in the bud, "Ah me, the day departs, the happy day of spring, and I am a prisoner in petals!"
Do not lose heart, timid thing! Your bonds will burst, the bud will open into flower, and when you die in the fulness of life, even then the spring will live on.
The odour pants and flutters within the bud, crying, "Ah me, the hours pass by, yet I do not know where I go, or what it is I seek!"
Do not lose heart, timid thing! The spring breeze has overheard your desire, the day will not end before you have fulfilled your being.
Dark is the future to her, and the odour cries in despair, "Ah me, through whose fault is my life so unmeaning?
"Who can tell me, why I am at all?" Do not lose heart, timid thing! The perfect dawn is near when you will mingle your life with all life and know at last your purpose.