Savitri – Eine Legende und ein Symbol. Sri Aurobindo

      Like a leaf spinning from the tree of heaven,

      In broad unconsciousness as in a pool;

      A hospitable softness drew her in

      Into a wonder of miraculous depths,

      Above her closed a darkness of great wings

      And she was buried in a mother’s breast.

      Then from a timeless plane that watches Time,

      A Spirit gazed out upon destiny,

      In its endless moment saw the ages pass.

      All still was in a silence of the gods.

      The prophet moment covered limitless Space

      And cast into the heart of hurrying Time

      A diamond light of the Eternal’s peace,

      A crimson seed of God’s felicity;

      A glance from the gaze fell of undying Love.

      A wonderful face looked out with deathless eyes;

      A hand was seen drawing the golden bars

      That guard the imperishable secrecies.

      A key turned in a mystic lock of Time.

      But where the silence of the gods had passed,

      A greater harmony from the stillness born

      Surprised with joy and sweetness yearning hearts,

      An ecstasy and a laughter and a cry.

      A power leaned down, a happiness found its home.

      Over wide earth brooded the infinite bliss.

      End of Canto One

      End of Book Eleven

      BOOK TWELVE

Epilogue

      Epilogue

      The Return to Earth

      Out of abysmal trance her spirit woke.

      Lain on the earth-mother’s calm inconscient breast

      She saw the green-clad branches lean above

      Guarding her sleep with their enchanted life,

      And overhead a blue-winged ecstasy

      Fluttered from bough to bough with high-pitched call.

      Into the magic secrecy of the woods

      Peering through an emerald lattice-window of leaves,

      In indolent skies reclined, the thinning day

      Turned to its slow fall into evening’s peace.

      She pressed the living body of Satyavan:

      On her body’s wordless joy to be and breathe

      She bore the blissful burden of his head

      Between her breasts’ warm labour of delight,

      The waking gladness of her members felt

      The weight of heaven in his limbs, a touch

      Summing the whole felicity of things,

      And all her life was conscious of his life

      And all her being rejoiced enfolding his.

      The immense remoteness of her trance had passed;

      Human she was once more, earth’s Savitri,

      Yet felt in her illimitable change.

      A power dwelt in her soul too great for earth,

      A bliss lived in her heart too large for heaven;

      Light too intense for thought and love too boundless

      For earth’s emotions lit her skies of mind

      And spread through her deep and happy seas of soul.

      All that is sacred in the world drew near

      To her divine passivity of mood.

      A marvellous voice of silence breathed its thoughts.

      All things in Time and Space she had taken for hers;

      In her they moved, by her they lived and were,

      The whole wide world clung to her for delight,

      Created for her rapt embrace of love.

      Now in her spaceless self released from bounds

      Unnumbered years seemed moments long drawn out,

      The brilliant time-flakes of eternity.

      Outwingings of a bird from its bright home,

      Her earthly morns were radiant flights of joy.

      Boundless she was, a form of infinity.

      Absorbed no longer by the moment’s beat

      Her spirit the unending future felt

      And lived with all the unbeginning past.

      Her life was a dawn’s victorious opening,

      The past and unborn days had joined their dreams,

      Old vanished eves and far arriving noons

      Hinted to her a vision of prescient hours.

      Supine in musing bliss she lay awhile

      Given to the wonder of a waking trance;

      Half-risen then she sent her gaze around,

      As if to recover old sweet trivial threads,

      Old happy thoughts, small treasured memories,

      And weave them into one immortal day.

      Ever she held on the paradise of her breast

      Her lover charmed into a fathomless sleep,

      Lain like an infant spirit unaware

      Lulled on the verge of two consenting worlds.

      But soon she leaned down over her loved to call

      His mind back to her with her travelling touch

      On his closed eyelids; settled was her still look

      Of strong delight, not yearning now, but large

      With limitless joy or sovereign last content,

      Pure, passionate with the passion of the gods.

      Desire stirred not its wings; for all was made

      An overarching of celestial rays

      Like the absorbed control of sky on plain,

      Heaven’s leaning down to embrace from all sides earth,

      A quiet rapture, a vast security.

      Then sighing to her touch the soft-winged sleep

      Rose hovering from his flowerlike lids and flew

      Murmurous away. Awake, he found her eyes

      Waiting for his, and felt her hands, and saw

      The earth his home given back to him once more

      And her made his again, his passion’s all.

      With his arms’ encircling hold around her locked,

      A living knot to make possession close,

      He murmured with hesitating lips her name,

      And vaguely recollecting wonder cried,

      “Whence hast thou brought me captive back, love-chained,

      To thee and sunlight’s walls, O golden beam

      And