**1
*Fireflies
±{Ms. 342 (A)}±
1
My fancies are fireflies,—
specks of living light
twinkling in the dark.
2
The same voice murmurs
in these desultory lines
which is born in wayside pansies
letting hasty glances pass by.
3
In the drowsy dark caves of the mind
dreams build their nest
with bits of things
dropped from day’s caravan.
4
Spring scatters
the petals of flowers
that are not for the fruits of the future
but for the moment’s whim.
5
Joy freed from the bond of earth’s slumber
rushes into the leaves numberless
and dances in the air for a day.
6
My words that are slight
may lightly dance upon time’s waves
while my wor<d>{k}s heavy with import sink.
7
Mind’s underground moths
grow filmy wings
and take a farewell flight
in the sunset sky till their hum is hushed.
8
The butterfly counts not months but moments
and has time enough.
**2
±{nos. 9-27?}±
28
The immortal, like a jewel,
does not boast
of a large surface in years,
but of a shining point
in a moment.
29
The child ever dwells in the mystery of an ageless time,
unobscured by the dust of history.
30
There is a light laughter in the steps of creation
that carries it swiftly across time.
31
One who was distant came near to me in the morning,
and came still nearer when taken away by night.
32
White and pink oleanders meet
and make merry in different dialects.
33
When peace is active sweeping its dirt,
it is storm.
34
The lake lies low by the hill,—
a tearful entreaty of love
at the foot of the inflexible.
35
There smiles the Divine Child
among his playthings of unmeaning clouds
and ephemeral lights and shadows.
36
The breeze whispers to the lotus,
“What is thy secret?”
“It is myself,” says the lotus,
“<+++> steal it and I disappear.”
37
The freedom of the storm and the bondage of the stem
join hands in the dance of swaying branches.
**3
38
The Jasmine’s lisping of love to the sun
is her flowers.
39
The tyrant claims freedam to kill freedom
and yet to keep it for himself.
40
Gods, tired of their paradise, envy man.
41
Clouds are hills in vapour,
hills are clouds in stone,—
a phantasy in time’s dream.
42
While God waits for his temple to be built of love
men bring stones.
43
Unimpassioned benevolence
insults the taste of the tongue,
only pitying the stomach’s need.
44
I touch God in my song
as the far away hill touches the sea
with its waterfall.
45
The crow<+++>{d} of stars in the night
point to her loneliness.
46
My heart today smiles at its past night of tears
like a wet tree glistening in the sun
after rain is over.
47
Life’s errors cry for the merciful beauty that
can modulate their isolation
into a harmony with the whole.
**4
48
They expect thanks for the banished nest
because their cage is shapely and secure.
49
In my love I pay my endless debt to thee
for what thou art.
50
The bottom of the pond, from its dark,
sends up its lyrics in lilies,
and the sun says, they are good.
51
Your calumny against the great
is impious,
it hurts yourself;
against the small it is mean,
for it hearts the victim.
52
The first flower that blossomed on this eath
was an invitation to me to sing.
53
Dawn— the many-coloured flower— fades,
and the sun comes out, the fruit of the simple
white light.
54
The muscle that has a doubt of its wisdom
throtles the voice that would cry.
55
Wind tries to take Flame by storm
only to blow her out.
56
Life’s play runs fast,
life’s playthings fall behind one by one
and are forgotten.
57
My flower, seek not thy paradise
in a fool’s buttonhole.
**5
58
Thou hast risen late, my crescent moon,
but my night-bird is still awake to greet you.
59
Darkness is the veiled bride
silently waiting for the errant light
to return to her bosom.
60
Mother Earth, with her ancient trees
points to the sky in ecstacy.
61
My self’s burden is lightened
when I laugh at myself.
62
The weak can be terrible because
he furiously tries to appear strong.
63
Breezes come from the sky,
the anchor desperately clutches the mud,
and my boat is beating its breast against the chain.
64
The blue of the sky longs for the earth’s green,
the wind between them sighs, “Alas”.
65
The breeze from the forest
startles the leaves of my book
and asks if the buds have blossomed in their words.
66
I decorate with futile fancies
my idle moments
and see them float away in the air
like derelict clouds with their cargo of colours
drifting from somewhere to no destination.
67
The cloud gives all its gold
to the departing sun
and greets the rising moon
with only a pale smile.
**6
68
Flower, have pity for the worm,
it is not a bee,
its love is a blunder and a burden.
69
By the ruins of terror’s triumph
the shepherd plays his pipe.
70
The lamp waits through the long day of neglect
for the flame’s kiss in the night.
71
Feathers lying in the dust
have forgotten their sky.
72
The world suffers most from the disinterested tyranny
of its well-wisher.
73
We gain freedom when we have paid
the full price for our right to live.
74
Your moments’ careless gifts,
like the meteors of an autumn night,
catch fire in the depth of my being.
75
Spring hesitates at Winter’s door,
but the flower rashly runs out
to him before her time and meets her doom.
76
The world is the ever-changing foam that floats on the
surface of a sea of silence.
77
The two separated shores mingle their voices
in a song of unfathomed tears.
**7
78
I lingered on my way
till thy cherry tree lost its blossoms,
but the azalea brings to me, my love,
thy forgiveness.
79
The shy little pomegranate bud,
blushing to-day behind her veil,
will burst into a passionate flower
tomorrow when I am away.
80
The clumsiness of power spoils the key,
and uses the pickaxe.
81
Birth is from the mystery of night
into the greater mystery of day.
82
My paper boats
sail away in play
with the burden of my empty hours.
83
Migratory songs from my heart
are on wings
Seeking their nests in love’s voice
in thee.
84
The sea of danger, doubt and denial
around man’s little island of certainty
challenges him across into the unknown.
85
Love punishes when it forgives,
and the injured beauty by its awful silence.
**8
88
God honours me when I work,
He loves me when I sing.
89
The same sun is newly born in new lands
in a ring of endless dawns.
90
God’s world is ever renewed by death
a Titan’s ever crushed by its own existence.
91
The glow-worm while exploring the dust
never knows that stars are in the sky.
92
The branch is of to-day, the flower is old,
it brings with it the message
of the immemorial seed.
93
Each rose that comes brings me greetings
from the Rose of an Eternal Spring.
94
My bird of to-day finds herself homeless
in yesterday’s deserted nest.
95
The fire of pain traces for my soul a luminous path
across her sorrow.
96
Realism boasts of its burden of sands
and forgets its loss in the current.
97
Since thou hast for ever vanished from my reach
I feel that the sky carries an impalpable touch in its
blueness and the wind an invisible image
in its movement among the shadows of the forest.
**9
98
Spring in pity for the desolate branch
left one fluttering leaf on the spot he kissed.
99
The shy shadow in the garden
loves the sun in silence,
flowers guess the secret,
and smile, while the leaves whisper.
100
While the rose said to the Sun
“I shall ever remember thee”,
her petals fell to the dust.
101
I leave no trace of wings in the air,
but I am glad I had my flight.
102
God watches with the same smile the single
night of a fire-fly
as the age-long nights of a star.
103
The mountain remains unmoved
at its seeming defeat by the mist.
104
The Devil’s wares are expensive,
God’s gifts are without price.
105
Hills are the silent cry of the earth
for the unreachable.
106
Though the thorn pricked me in thy flower,
O Beauty,
I am grateful.
107
The world ever knows
that the few are more than the many.
**10
108
Let not my love be a burden on you, my friend,
know that it pays itself.
109
Dawn plays her lute before the gate of darkness,
till the sun comes out and sees her vanish.
110
Truth{’s} smile<s> <in> {is} beauty
when {she} <it sees> {beholds} <its> {her} own face in a perfect mirror.
111
The dew-drop knows the sun
only within its own tiny orb.
112
Forlorn thoughts from the forsaken hives of all ages,
swarming in the air,
seek their home in my voice.
113
The desert is imprisoned in the wall of its unbounded barrenness.
114
I see the air’s great dance
in the thrills of little leaves,
the heart-beats of the sky in their glimmer.
115
He owns the world who knows its law,
he who feels its truth loves it.
116
The earth’s sacrificial fire
flames up in her trees—
scattering sparks in flowers.
117
Forests, the clouds of earth,
hold up to the sky their silence,
and clouds from above come down
in resonant showers.
**11
118
The world speaks to me in pictures,
my soul answers in music.
119
The sky tells its beads all night
on the countless stars
in memory of the sun.
120
The darkness of night, like pain,
is dumb, and darkness of dawn, like peace,
is silent.
121
Pride engraves his frowns in stones,
love hides them in flowers.
122
The obsequious brush curtails truth
in deference to the canvas
which is narrow.
123
I see an unseen kiss from the sky
in its response in my rose.
124
The hill in its longing for the far away sky
wishes to be like the cloud
with its endless joy of seeking.
125
To justify their own spilling of ink
They spell the day as night.
126
Profit laughs at goodness
when the good is profitable.
127
In the swelling pride of its own truth
the bubble doubts the truth of the sea,
and laughs and bursts into emptiness.
**12
128
My clouds sorrowing in the dark,
forget that they themselves
have hidden the sun.
129
Man discovers his own wealth
when God comes to ask gifts of him.
130
You have left your memory as a flame
to my lonely lamp of separation.
131
I came to offer thee a flower,
but thou must have all my garden.
It is thine.
132
The picture— a memory of light
treasured by the shadow.
133
It is easy to make faces at the sun,
he is exposed by his own light to all directions.
134
History slowly smothers its truth,
but hastily struggles to revive it
in the terrible penance of pain.
135
My work is rewarded in daily wages,
I wait for my own final value in love.
136
Beauty knows to say, “Enough”,
barbarism clamours for still more.
137
God loves to see in me not his servant
but himself who serves all.
**13
138
The darkness of night is in harmony with day,—
the morning of mist discordant.
139
In the bounteous time of roses
love is wine,
It is food in the famished hour
when their petals are shed.
140
The morning lamp on the lamp post mockingly challenges
the sun with the light it has
borrowed from him.
141
An unknown flower in a strange land
speaks to the poet:
“Are we not of the same soil, my lover?”
142
I am able to love my God
because he gives me freedom to deny him.
143
My untuned strings beg for music
in their anguished cry of shame.
144
The worm thinks it strange and foolish
that man does not eat his books.
145
The clouded sky today bears the vision of a divine shadow
of sadness on the forehead of brooding eternity.
146
The shade of my trees is for passers-by
its fruit for the one for whom I wait.
147
Flushed with the glow of sunset
earth seems like a ripe fruit
ready to be harvested by night.
**14
148
Light accepts darkness for his spouse
for the sake of creation.
149
The reed waits for his Master’s breath,
the Master goes seeking for his reed.
150
To the blind pen the hand that writes
is unreal,
its writing unmeaning.
151
In thine own self is forged a chain
with which thy tyrant binds thee.
152
The sea smites his own barren breast
because he has no flowers to offer to the moon.
153
The greed for fruit misses the flower.
154
God in his temple of stars
waits for man to bring him his lamp.
155
The fire restrained in the tree fashions flowers.
Released from bonds, the shameless flame dies
in barren ashes.
156
Too ready to blame the bad,
Too reluctant to praise the good.
157
The sky sets no snare to capture the moon,
it is his own freedom which binds him.
158
The light that fills the sky
seeks its limit in a dew-drop on the grass.
**15
159
Wealth is the burden of bigness,
Welfare the fullness of being.
160
The razor-blade is proud of its keenness
when it sneers at the sun.
161
The butterfly has leisure
to love the lotus,
not the bee busily storing honey.
162
The mist weaves her net round the morning,
captivates him, and makes him blind.
163
The Morning Star whispers to Dawn
“Tell me that you are only for me”.
“Yes”, she anwers, “and also
only for that nameless flower”.
164
The sky remains infinitely vacant
for earth to build there
its heaven with dreams.
165
Let the evening forgive the mistakes of the day
and thus win peace for herself.
166
Beauty smiles in the confinement of the bud,
in the heart of a sweet incompleteness.
167
The Spring Day like a sun-flower opened its heart
whose golden petals were only lightly brushed
by your flitting love with its coloured wings.
168
Leaves are masses of silence
round flowers which are their words.
**16
169
Love creates with the soul which can attract and umite,
ambition manipulates with the muscle
which can gather and fasten with chains.
170
The tree bears its thousands years
as one large majestic moment.
171
My offerings are <h>{n}ot for the temple at the end of the road,
but for the wayside shrines that surprise me at every bend.
172
Your smile, my love,
like the smell of a strange flower,
seems simple
and yet inexplicable.
173
Death laughs when we exaggerate the merit of the dead,
for it swells his store with more than he can claim.
174
The sigh of the shore follows in vain
the breeze that hastens the ship
across the sea.
175
Truth loves its limits,
for there it meets the beautiful.
176
Between the shores of Me and Thee
there is the loud ocean, my own surging self,
which I long to cross.
177
The right to possess foolishly boasts
of its right to enjoy.
178
The rose is a great deal more
than a blushing apology for its thorn.
**17
179
The Eternal Dancer dances
in the flower in spring,
in the harvest in autumn,
in thy limbs, my child,
in thy thoughts and dreams.
180
Day offers to the silence of stars
his golden lute to be tuned
for the endless life.
181
The wise knows how to teach,
the fool how to smite.
182
The centre is still and silent in the heart
of an eternal dance of circles.
183
The judge thinks that he is just when he compares
the oil of another{’s} lamp
with the light of his own.
184
The captive flower in the King’s wreath
bitterly smiles when the meadow-flower envies her.
185
Its store of snow is the hill’s own burden,
its outpouring of streams is borne by all the world.
186
I hear the prayer to the sun from the myriad buds in the forest
“Open our eyes”.
187
Let your love see me
even through the barrier of nearness.
188
The spirit of work in creation is there
to carry and help the spirit of play.
**18
189
To carry the burden of the instrument,
count the cost of its material,
and never to know that it is for music,
is the tragedy of life’s deafness.
190
Faith is the bird that feels the light
and sings when the dawn is still dark.
191
I bring to thee, night, my day’s empty cup,
to be cleaned with thy cool darkness
for a new morning’s festival.
192
The mountain fir keeps hidden
the memory of its struggle with the storm
murmuring in its rustling boughs
a hymn of peace.
193
God honoured me with <his fight> {battle}
when I was rebellious;
he ignored me when I was languid.
194
The man proud of his sect thinks
that he has the sea
ladled into his private pond.
195
The dark Unseen plays on his flute
and the rhythm of light
eddies into stars and suns,
into thoughts and dreams.
196
Let my love feel its strength
in the service of day,
its peace in the union of night.
197
Life sends up in blades of grass
its silent hymn of praise
to the unnamed Light.
**19
198
The stars of night are the memorials for me
of my day’s faded flowers.
199
Open thy door to that which must go,
for the loss becomes unseemly when obstructed.
200
True end is not in the reaching of the limit,
but in a completion which is limitless.
201
The shore whispers to the sea:
“Write to me what thy waves struggle to say”.
The sea writes in foam again and again
and wipes off the lines in a boisterous despair.
202
Let the touch of thy finger thrill my life’s strings
and make the music thine and mine.
203
The inner world rounded in my life, like a fruit,
matured in sun and shower,
in joy and sorrow,
will drop into the darkness of the original soil
for some further course of creation.
204
Form is in Matter, rhythm in Force,
meaning in the Person.
205
There are seekers of wisdom and seekers of wealth,
I seek thy company so that I may sing.
206
Like the tree its leaves, I scatter my speech
on the dust,
Let my words unuttered flower in thy silence.
207
My faith in truth, my vision of the perfect,
help thee, Master, in thy creation.
**20
208
All the delights that I have felt
in life’s fruits and flowers
let me offer to thee
at the end of the feast,
in a perfect unity
of love.
209
Some have thought deep
and explored the meaning of thy truth,
and they are great:
I have listened to catch the music
of thy play,
and I am content.
210
The lotus offers its beauty to the <sun> {heaven,}
The grass its service to the Earth.
211
The sun’s kiss mellows the miserliness
of the green fruit clinging to its stem
into an utter surrender.
212
The flame met the earthen lamp in me
and what a great marvel of light.
213
Mistakes live in the neighbourhood of truth
and therefore delude us.
214
The cloud laughed at the rainbow
saying that it was an upstart
gaudy in its emptiness.
The rainbow calmly answered:
“I am as inevitably real as the sun himself.”
215
Let me not grope in vain in the dark
but keep my mind still in the faith
that the day will break
and truth will appear in the majesty
of its simplicity.
**21
216
Sea ever seeks his words
from his sounds and silence
as Sky from his darkness and light.
217
My new love comes
bringing to me the eternal wealth
of the old.
218
My lamp goes out,
thy stars remain to show me the path.
219
Day with its glare of curiosity
makes the stars disappear.
220
My mind has its true union with thee,
O Sky,
at the window which is mine own,
and not in the open
where thou hast thy sole kingdom.
221
Dead leaves when they lose themselves
in the soil
take part in the life of the forest.
222
I leave my songs behind me, O Spring,
with the bloom of the ever returning honeysuckles
and joy of the wind from the south.
223
Like my heart’s pain that has long
missed its meaning,
the sun’s rays robed in dark
hide themselves under the ground.
Like my heart’s pain
at love’s sudden touch
they change their veil at the spring’s call
and come out in the carnival of colours
in flowers and leaves.
