Aurobindo 97 Savitri Book 7 Poem by Indira Renganathan

An appreciation on Savitri
Book Seven: The Book of Yoga
Canto Two: The Parable of the Search for the Soul
Words within inverted commas are Aurobindo's

'Then Savitri by her doomed husband sat, '
'Impassive mid the movement and the cry,
Witness of the thoughts of mind, the moods of life,
She looked into herself and sought for her soul.'
A dream disclosed to her the cosmic past,
The shadowy beginnings of world-fate:
A lamp of symbol lighting hidden truth
Imaged to her the world's significance.'

'A consciousness looked at the inconscient Vast
And pleasure and pain stirred in the insensible Void.
All was the deed of a blind World-Energy:
'A conscious soul in the Inconscient's world,
'Hidden behind our thoughts and hopes and dreams, '
'Leaves the vicegerent mind a seeming king.'
'In his floating house upon the sea of Time
The regent sits at work and never rests: '

This is the little surface of man's life.
He is this and he is all the universe; '
'But all is there, even God's opposites; '
'Man's house of life holds not the gods alone:
There are occult Shadows, there are tenebrous Powers,
Inhabitants of life's ominous nether rooms,
A shadowy world's stupendous denizens.'
'Man harbours dangerous forces in his house.'

'Inferno surges into the human air
And touches all with a perverting breath.'
'He is bound and forced, a victim of the play,
Or, allured, joys in the mad and mighty din.
'Once quelled or wearing specious names and vests
Infernal elements, demon powers are there.'

............My consciousness this moment,
O'Guru, I'm in awe....in invincible heights
Ineffable Thee embellishing poetic creation
My inquisitive apprehension, erring Thee may opine
May there so, let Savitri in my self arise
Aroused there so be knowledge and fortune

==============================================
Note: Some more inspiring, descriptive and
informative lines from Book 7 Canto 2

Page478

Then Savitri by her doomed husband sat,
Still rigid in her golden motionless pose,
A statue of the fire of the inner sun.

This mind no silence knows nor dreamless sleep,
In the incessant circling of its steps
Thoughts tread for ever through the listening brain;
It toils like a machine and cannot stop.

Page 480

A careless guardian of his nature's powers,
Man harbours dangerous forces in his house.