Chapter 3

But I spoke tenderly, and said, “Beloved, Shall not thy lips give orders to my heart? Yet there is one small matter in these hills Claiming attention ere I can depart.

“Let us not waste these days; thine absent lord Cannot return, thou know’st, before the snow Has melted, and the almond fruits appear.” This time she answered, “Naught but thee I know!”

I too was young; I could have loved her well When her soft eyes across the twilight burned; But suddenly, around her amber neck, The golden beads would sparkle as she turned.

_And I remembered_; swift mine eyelids fell To hide the hate that festered in my soul, Ever more deeply, with the rising fear That Love might wrench Revenge from my control.

But when at last she, acquiescent, lay In the sweet-scented shadow of the firs, Lovely and broken, granting--asking--all, It was _his_ eyes I met: not hers--not hers!

* * *

Three months I waited: all the village talked, And ever anxiously she urged our flight. Yet still I lingered, till her beauty paled, And wearily she came to me at night.

Then, seeing Love, subservient to Revenge, Had well achieved his own creative end, And in his work must soon be manifest, Compassing thus my duty to my friend,

One tranquil, sultry night I rode away Till far behind the purple hills were dim, Exulting in my spirit, “Thus I leave Her to her fate, and my revenge to him!”

Swiftly he struck, her lord; the body lay With hacked-off breasts, dishonoured, in the Pass. Months later, riding lonely through the gorge, I saw it still, among the long-grown grass.

It was well done; my soul is satisfied. Friendship is sweet, and Love is sweeter still, But Vengeance has a savour all its own-- A strange delight--well known to those who kill.

Such was the story Afzul told to me, While wood-fires crackled in the evening breeze, And blows on hammered tent-pegs stirred the air Sweet with the fragrance from the Sinjib trees.

Tent-like, above, up-held by jagged peaks, The heavy purple of the tranquil sky Shed its oft-broken promises of peace, While twinkling stars bemocked the worn-out lie!

Nay, not To-night

Nay, not to-night;--the slow, sad rain is falling Sorrowful tears, beneath a grieving sky, Far off a famished jackal, faintly calling, Renders the dusk more lonely with its cry.

The mighty river rushes, sobbing, seawards, The shadows shelter faint mysterious fears, I turn mine eyes for consolation theewards, And find thy lashes tremulous with tears.

If some new soul, asearch for incarnation, Should, through our kisses, enter Life again, It would inherit all our desolation, All the soft sorrow of the slanting rain.

When thou desirest Love’s supreme surrender, Come while the morning revels in the light, Bulbuls around us, passionately tender, Singing among the roses red and white.

Thus, if it be my sweet and sacred duty, Subservient to the Gods’ divine decree, To give the world again thy vivid beauty, I should transmit it with my joy in thee.

I could not if I would, Beloved, deceive thee. Wouldst thou not feel at once a feigned caress? Yet, do not rise, I would not have thee leave me, My soul needs thine to share its loneliness.

Let the dim starlight, when the low clouds sunder, Silver the perfect outline of thy face. Such faces had the saints; I only wonder That thine has sought my heart for resting-place.

The Dying Prince

There are no days for me any more, for the dawn is dark with tears, There is no rest for me any more, for the night is thick with fears. There are no flowers nor any fruit, for the sorrowful locusts came, And the garden is but a memory, the vineyard only a name.

There is no light in the empty sky, no sail upon the sea, Birds are yet on their nests perchance, but they sing no more to me. Past--vanished--faded away--all the joys that were. My youth died down in a swift decline when they married her to despair.

“My lord, the crowd in the Audience Hall; how long wilt thou have them wait?” I have given my father’s younger son the guidance of the State. “The steeds are saddled, the Captains call for the orders of the day.” Tell them that I shall ride no more to the hunting or the fray.

“Sweet the scent of the Moghra flowers;” Brother, it may be so. “The young, flushed spring is with us again.” Is it? I did not know. “The Zamorin’s daughter draweth near, on slender golden feet;” Oh, a curse upon all sweet things say I, to whom they are no more sweet!

Dost think that a man as sick as I can compass a woman’s ease? That the sons of a man who is like to me could ever find rest or peace? Tell them to marry them where they will, if their longing be so sore, Such are the things that all men seek, but I shall seek no more.

All my muscles are fallen in, and the blood deserts my veins, Every fibre and bone of me is waxen full of pains, The iron feet of mine enemy’s curse are heavy upon my head, Look at me and judge for thyself, thou seest I am but dead.

“Then, who is it, Prince, who has done this thing, has sown such a bitter seed, That we hale him forth to the Market-place, bind him and let him bleed, That the flesh may shudder and wince and writhe, reddening ’neath the rod.” Love is the evil-doer, alas! and how shalt thou scourge a God?

The Hut

Dear little Hut by the rice-fields circled, That cocoa-nuts shade above. I hear the voices of children singing, And that means love.

When shall the traveller’s march be over, When shall his wandering cease? This little homestead is bare and simple, And that means peace.

Nay! to the road I am not unfaithful; In tents let my dwelling be! I am not longing for Peace or Passion From any one else but thee, My Krishna, Any one else but thee!

My Paramour was Loneliness

My paramour was loneliness And lying by the sea, Soft songs of sorrow and distress He did beget in me.

Later another lover came More meet for my desire, “Radiant Beauty” was his name; His sons had wings of fire!

The Rice was under Water

The Rice was under water, and the land was scourged with rain, The nights were desolation, and the day was born in pain. Ah, the famine and the fever and the cruel, swollen streams, I had died, except for Krishna, who consoled me--in my dreams!

The Burning-Ghats were smoking, and the jewels melted down, The Temples lay deserted, for the people left the town. Yet I was more than happy, though passing strange it seems, For I spent my nights with Krishna, who loved me--in my dreams!

“Surface Rights”

Drifting, drifting down the River, Tawny current and foam-flecked tide, Sorrowful songs of lonely boatmen, Mournful forests on either side.

Thine are the outcrops’ glittering blocks, The quartz where the rich pyrites gleam, The golden treasure of unhewn rocks And the loose gold in the stream.

But,--the dim vast forests along the shore, That whisper wonderful things o’ nights,-- These are things that I value more, My beautiful “surface rights.”

Drifting, drifting down the River,-- Stars a-tremble about the sky-- Ah, my lover, my heart is breaking, Breaking, breaking, I know not why.

Why is Love such a sorrowful thing? This I never could understand; Pain and passion are linked together, Ever I find them hand in hand.

Loose thy hair in its soft profusion, Let thy lashes caress thy cheek,-- These are the things that express thy spirit, What is the need to explain or speak?

Drifting, drifting along the River, Under the light of a wan low moon, Steady, the paddles; Boatmen, steady,-- Why should we reach the sea so soon?

See where the low spit cuts the water, What is that misty wavering light? Only the pale datura flowers Blossoming through the silent night.

What is the fragrance in thy tresses? ’T is the scent of the champa’s breath; The meaning of champa bloom is passion-- And of datura--death!

Sweet are thy ways and thy strange caresses, That sear as flame, and exult as wine. But I care only for that wild moment When my soul arises and reaches thine.

Wistful voices of wild birds calling-- Far, faint lightning towards the West,-- Twinkling lights of a Tyah homestead,-- Ruddy glow on a girl’s bare breast--

Drifting boats on a mournful River, Shifting thoughts in a dreaming mind,-- We two, seeking the Sea, together,-- When we reach it,--what shall we find?

Shivratri (the Night of Shiva)

(While the procession passed at Ramesram)

Nearer and nearer cometh the car Where the Golden Goddess towers, Sweeter and sweeter grows the air From a thousand trampled flowers. We two rest in the Temple shade Safe from the pilgrim flood, This path of the Gods in olden days Ran royally red with blood.

Louder and louder and louder yet Throbs the sorrowful drum-- That is the tortured world’s despair, Never a moment dumb. Shriller and shriller shriek the flutes, Nature’s passionate need-- Paler and paler grow my lips, And still thou bid’st them bleed.

Deeper and deeper and deeper still, Never a pause for pain-- Darker and darker falls the night That golden torches stain. Closer, ah! closer, and still more close, Till thy soul reach my soul-- Further, further, out on the tide From the shores of self-control.

Glowing, glowing, to whitest heat, Thy feverish passions burn, Fiercer and fiercer, cruelly fierce, To thee my senses yearn. Fainter and fainter runs my blood With desperate fight for breath-- This, my Beloved, thou sayest is Love, Or I should have deemed it Death!

The First Wife

Ah, my lord, are the tidings true, That thy mother’s jewels are shapen anew?

I hear that a bride has chosen been, The stars consulted, the parents seen.

Had I been childless, had never there smiled The brilliant eyes from the face of a child,

Then at least I had understood This thing they tell me thou findest good.

But I have been down to the River of Death, With painful footsteps and shuddering breath,

Seven times; thou hast daughters three, And four young sons who are fair as thee.

I am not unlovely, over my head Not twenty summers as yet have sped.

’T is eleven years since my opening life Was given to thee by my father’s wife.

Ah, those days--They were lovely to me, When little and shy I waited for thee.

Till I locked my arms round my lover above, A child in form but a woman in love.

And I bore thy sons, as a woman should, Year by year, as is meet and good.

Thy mother was ever content with me-- And Oh, Beloved, I worshipped thee!

And now it’s over; alas, my lord, Better I felt thy sharpest sword.

I hear she is youthful and fair as I When I came to thee in the days gone by.

Her breasts are firmer; this bosom slips Somewhat, weighted by children’s lips.

But they were thy children. Oh, lord my king, Ah, why hast thy heart devised this thing?

I am not as the women of this thy land, Meek and timid, broken to hand.

From the distant North I was given to thee, Whose daughters are passionate, fierce and free,

I could not dwell by a rival’s side, I seek a bridegroom, as thou a bride.

The night she yieldeth her youth to thee, Death shall take his pleasure in me.

I Arise and go Down to the River

I arise and go down to the River, and currents that come from the sea, Still fresh with the salt of the ocean, are lovely and precious to me, The waters are silver and silent, except where the kingfisher dips, Or the ripples wash off from my shoulder the reddening stain of thy lips.

Two things make my joy at this moment: thy gold-coloured beauty by night, And the delicate charm of the River, all pale in the day-breaking light, So cool are the waters’ caresses. Ah, which is the lovelier,--this? Or the fire that it kindles at midnight, beneath the soft glow of thy kiss?

Ah, Love has a mighty dominion, he forges with passionate breath The links which stretch out to the Future, with forces of life and of death, But great is the charm of the River, so soft is the sigh of the reeds, They give me, long sleepless from passion, the peace that my weariness needs.

I float on the breast of my River, and startle the birds on the edge, To land on a newly found island, a boat that is caught in the sedge, The rays of the sun are still level, not yet has the heat of the day Deflowered the mists of the morning, that linger in delicate grey.

What land was his dwelling whose fancy first gave unto Paradise birth? He never had swum in my River, or else he had fixed it on earth! Oh, grace of the palm-tree reflections, Oh, sense of the wind from the sea! Oh, divine and serene exultation of one who is lonely and free!

Ah, delicate breezes of daybreak, so scentless, refreshing and free! And yet--had my midnight been lonely you had been less lovely to me. This coolness comes laden with solace, because I am hot from the fire, As often devotion to virtue arises from sated desire.

_Gautama came forth from his Palace; he felt the night wind on his face,_ _He loathed, as he left, the embraces, the softness and scent of the place,_ _But, ah, if his night had been loveless, with no one to solace his need,_ _He never had written that sermon which men so devotedly read._

Ah, River, thy gentle persuasion! I doubt if I seek any more The beauty that hurts me and holds me beneath the low roof on the shore. I loved thee, ay, loved--for a season, but thou, was it love or desire, The glow of the Sun in his glory, or only the heat of a fire?

I think not that thou wilt regret me, for thou art too joyous and fair, So many are keen to caress thee, thy passionate midnights to share. Thou wilt not have time to remember, before a new love-knot is tied, The stranger who loved thee and left thee, who drifted away on the tide.

Two things I have found that are lovely, though most things are sullen and grey; One: Peace--but what mortal has found him; and Passion--but when would he stay? So I shall return to my River, and floating at ease on its breast, Shall find, what Love never has given--a sense of most infinite rest.

When the years have gone by and departed, what thought shall I keep of this land? A curl of thy waist-reaching-tresses? a flower received from thy hand? Nay, if I can fathom the future, I fancy my relic will be Some shell, my beloved one, the River, has stol’n from the store of the sea.

Listen, Beloved

Listen, Beloved, the Casurinas quiver, Each tassel prays the wind to set it free, Hark to the frantic sobbing of the river, Wild to attain extinction in the sea. All Nature blindly struggles to dissolve In other forms and forces, thus to solve The painful riddle of identity. Ah, that my soul might lose itself in thee!

Yet, my Beloved One, wherefore seek I union, Since there is no such thing in all the world,-- Are not our spirits linked in close communion,-- And on my lips thy clinging lips are curled? Thy tender arms are round my shoulders thrown, I hear thy heart more loudly than my own, And yet, to my despair, I know thee far, As in the stellar darkness, star from star.

Even in times when love with bounteous measure A simultaneous joy on us has shed, In the last moment of delirious pleasure, Ere the sense fail, or any force be fled, My rapture has been even as a wall, Shutting out any thought of thee at all! My being, by its own delight possessed, Forgot that it was sleeping on thy breast.

Ay, from his birth each man is vowed and given To a vast loneliness, ungauged, unspanned, Whether by pain and woe his soul be riven, Or all fair pleasures clustered ’neath his hand. His gain by day, his ecstasy by night,-- His force, his folly, fierce or faint delight,-- Suffering or sorrow, fortune, feud, or care,-- Whate’er he find or feel,--he may not share.

Lonely we join the world, and we depart Even as lonely, having lived alone, The breast that feeds us, the beloved one’s heart, The lips we kiss,--or curse--alike unknown. Ay, even these lips of thine, so often kissed, What certitude have I that they exist? Alas, it is the truth, though harsh it seems, I have been loved as sweetly in my dreams.

Therefore if I should seem too fiercely fond, Too swift to love, too eager to attain, Forgive the fervour that would forge beyond The limits set to mortal joy and pain. Knowing the soul’s unmeasured loneliness, My passion must be mingled with distress, As I, despairing, struggle to draw near What is as unattainable as dear.

Thirst may be quenched at any kindly river, Rest may be found ’neath any arching tree. No sleep allures, no draughts of love deliver My spirit from its aching need of thee. Thy sweet assentiveness to my demands, All the caressive touches of thy hands,-- These soft cool hands, with fingers tipped with fire,-- They can do nothing to assuage desire.

Sometimes I think my longing soul remembers A previous love to which it aims and strives, As if this fire of ours were but the embers Of some wild flame burnt out in former lives. Perchance in earlier days I _did_ attain That which I seek for now so all in vain, Maybe my soul with thine _was_ fused and wed In some great night, long since dissolved and dead.

We may progress; but who shall answer clearly The riddle of the endless change of things. Perchance in other days men loved more dearly, Or Love himself had wider ways and wings, Maybe we gave ourselves with less control, Or simpler living left more free the soul, So that with ease the flesh aside was flung,-- Or was it merely that _Mankind was young?_

Or has my spirit a divine prevision Of vast vague passions stored in days to be, When some strong souls shall conquer their division And two shall be as one, eternally? Finding at last upon each other’s breast, Unutterable calm and infinite rest, While love shall burn with such intense a glow That both shall die, and neither heed or know.

Why do I question thus, and wake confusion In the soft thought that lights thy perfect face, Ah, shed once more thy perfumed hair’s profusion, Open thine arms and make my resting place. Lay thy red lips on mine as heretofore, Grant me the treasure of thy beauty’s store, Stifle all thought in one imperious kiss,-- What shall I ask for more than this,--and this?

Oh, Unforgotten and Only Lover

Oh, unforgotten and only lover, Many years have swept us apart, But none of the long dividing seasons Slay your memory in my heart. In the clash and clamour of things unlovely My thoughts drift back to the times that were, When I, possessing thy pale perfection, Kissed the eyes and caressed the hair.

Other passions and loves have drifted Over this wandering, restless soul, Rudderless, chartless, floating always With some new current of chance control. But thine image is clear in the whirling waters-- Ah, forgive--that I drag it there, For it is so part of my very being That where I wander it too must fare.

Ah, I have given thee strange companions, To thee--so slender and chaste and cool-- But a white star loses no glimmer of beauty In all the mud of a miry pool That holds the grace of its white reflection; Nothing could fleck thee, nothing could stain, Thou hast made a home for thy delicate beauty Where all things peaceful and lovely reign.

Doubtless the night that my soul remembers Was a sin to thee, and thine only one. Thou thinkest of it, if thou thinkest ever, As a crime committed, a deed ill done. But for me, the broken, the desert-dweller, Following Life through its underways,-- I know if those midnights thou hadst not granted I had not lived through these after days.

And that had been well for me; all would say so, What have I done since I parted from thee? But things that are wasted, and full of ruin, All unworthy, even of me. Yet, it was to me that the gift was given, No greater joy have the Gods above,-- That night of nights when my only lover, Though all reluctant, granted me love.

For thy beauty was mine, and my spirit knows it, Never, ah, never my heart forgets, One thing fixed, in the torrent of changing, Faults and follies and fierce regrets. Thine eyes and thy hair, that were lovely symbols Of that white soul that their grace enshrined, They are part of me and my life for ever, In every fibre and cell entwined.

Men might argue that having known thee I had grown faithful and pure as thee, Had turned at the touch of thy grace and glory From the average pathways trodden by me. Hadst thou been kinder or I been stronger It may be even these things had been-- But one thing is clear to my soul for ever, I owe my owning of thee to sin.

Had I been colder I had not reached thee, Besmirched the ermine, beflecked the snow-- It was only sheer and desperate passion That won thy beauty in years ago. And not for the highest virtues in Heaven, The utmost grace that the soul can name, Would I resign what the sin has brought me, Which I hold glory, and thou--thy shame.

I talk of sin in the usual fashion, But God knows what is a sin to me-- We love more fiercely or love more faintly-- But I doubt if it matters how these things be. The best and the worst of us all sink under-- What I held passion and thou held’st lust-- What name will it find in a few more seasons, When we both dissolve in an equal dust?

If a God there be, and a God seems needed To make the beauty of things like thee, He doubtless also, some careless moment, Mixed the forces that fashioned me. Also He, for His own good reason-- Though I care little how these things are-- Gave me thee, in those few brief midnights, And that one solace He never can mar.

Ah me, the stars of such varying heavens Have watched me, under such alien skies, Lay thy beauty naked before me To soothe and solace my world-worn eyes. For one good gift to me has been given-- A memory accurate, clear and keen, That holds the vision, perfect for ever In charm and glory, of things once seen.

So I hold thee there, and my fancy wanders To each known beauty and blue-veined place, I know how each separate eyelash trembles, And every shadow that sweeps thy face. And this is a joy of which none can rob me, This is a pleasure that none can mar-- As sweet as thou wert, in that long past midnight, Even as lovely my memories are.

Ah, unforgotten and only lover, If ever I drift across thy thought, As even a vision unloved, unlovely, May cross the fancy, uncalled, unsought, When the years that pass thee have shown, in passing, That my love, _in its strength at least_, was rare-- Wilt thou not think--ah, hope of the hopeless-- E’en as thou wouldst not, thou wilt not--care!

Early Love

Who says I wrong thee, my half-opened rose? Little he knows of thee or me, or love.-- I am so tender of thy fragile youth, Yea, in my hours of wildest ecstasy, Keeping close-bitted each careering sense. Only I give mine eyes unmeasured law To feed them where they will, and _their_ delight Was curbed at first, until thy tender shame Died in the bearing of thy first born joy.

I am not cruel, my half-opened rose, Though in the sunshine of my own desire I have uncurled thy petals to the light And fed the tendrils of thy dawning sense With delicate caresses, till they leave Thee tremulous with the newness of thy joy, Sharing thy lover’s fire with innocent flame.