Book-9-Study-Canto-2

Book Nine: Canto 2

The Journey in Eternal Night and the Voice of Darkness

Summary
All pause for a while on the edge of the dark Night. Then Savitri steps forward to journey through that eternal Night. A mysterious terror closes on her from all sides. Savitri vanishes into the dark. There is no path, no goal; yet she moves on. She loses sight of the God of Death as well as of Satyavan. But she does not lose heart; she continues to live and move.

Slowly a faint gleam appears. It throws the Night into a bolder relief. The giant head of Nothingness tries to stifle the ray, but in vain. The light prevails and Savitri recovers her lost self. Once again she hears the steps of the god and out of the darkness, Satyavan shows as a luminous shade.

Then is heard the lethal voice of Death proclaiming that this dark Night, this Nothingness is the end and the source of all. Where in this stark emptiness is there place for life and love? the voice asks mockingly.

Savitri refuses to answer. She gazes into her soul and knows that she is eternal. Then Death, the dire god, opposes her with his endless night and calls:

Thou hast survived the void and won a victory, but to what purpose? Thou cant only live for a little while without Satyavan. Man is a fragile creature with death prowling round him in all directions. The gods have burdened him with a mind and sown in his heart an incurable unrest. He is the Cattle of the shepherd gods. If thou still hopest to live, to love, return to the earth. But do not hope to win back Satyavan. Still, thlt unique strength deserves a reward. Choose what tlfeft wilt, I shall give.

Death is unmoved. He cries out scornfully:

Dost thou forget that thou art a mere mortal? I, Death, have created all and I destroy all. I reward, I punish. Flee back lest the Furies strike at thee.

But Savitri replies with equal scorn:

My God is not the God of thy imagination. My God is Love that sweetly suffers all. To him who is irresistible I have offered my life. He is supreme, he shall remake thy universe, O Death.

For a while they journey in silence in that trackless night. Then again Death speaks:

Wilt thou claim immortality, thou who art but a sparkling ferment in life’s sunlit mire? Only I am eternal, I am the Vast. I am He, there is no other God. Man has no other help than myself. I am his final refuge. Even if there were a being witnessing all, sole and absolute, neither Satyavan nor Savitri exists beside him. There is no Love there, nor Time nor Space. Forget Satyavan, be thou alone and sufficient to thy soul till I, Death, shall rescue thee from life.

Savitri replies:

O Death, thou reasonest, I do not reason, I am, I love, I act, I will.

Death answers:

Know also. When thou wilt know, then thou shalt cease to love and accept the impermanence of things.

Savitri replies:

Only when I have loved for ever, shall I know. Love in me knows the unchanging truth behind all change. I know the transcendent God above, the Lord of the universe, God the Indweller. I know my coming was a wave from God. I know that man was born with a mind and heart to conquer thee.

Death does not answer again. Compelled by Savitri, the three glide through the long fading night.

On the Brink

Awhile on the chill dreadful edge of Night
All stood as if a world were doomed to die
And waited on the eternal silence’ brink.

Heaven leaned towards them like a cloudy brow
Of menace through the dim and voiceless hush.

All stands still on the bleak edge of Night as though the world is doomed to die and awaits death on the brink of the eternal silence. Heaven leans down on them like a menace through the dim and mute hush.

They Pause

As thoughts stand mute on a despairing verge
Where the last depths plunge into nothingness
And the last dreams must end, they paused; in their front
Were glooms like shadowy wings, behind them pale
The lifeless evening was a dead man’s gaze.

Even as thoughts pause in dumb despair having reached a boundary when to plunge further would lead to nothingness, where even dreams must end, pause these three — Savitri, Death, Satyavan. Ahead of them are realms of gloom like shadowy wings on either side; behind them is the lifeless eve pale like the gaze of a dead man.

Her Flame-Bright Spirit

Hungry beyond, the night desired her soul.

But still in its lone niche of templed strength
Motionless, her flame-bright spirit, mute, erect,
Burned like a torch-fire from a windowed room
Pointing against the darkness’ sombre breast.

The Darkness ahead looks as if it is hungry and eager to swallow Savitri’s soul. But in her heart of pure strength, her flame-bright spirit burns unobscured, still, straight, pointing as it were against the dark breast of the Night.

She Affronts the Abyss

The Woman first affronted the Abyss
Daring to journey through the eternal Night.

Armoured with light she advanced her foot to plunge
Into the dread and hueless vacancy;
Immortal, unappalled her spirit faced
The danger of the ruthless eyeless waste.

Savitri cares not for the Abyss; she dares to proceed ahead trough the eternal Darkness. Protected by light she.raises her foot to step into the awesome, blank vacancy. Immortal, undeterred, her fiery spirit confronts the danger of the insensible unseeing waste.

Gliding on

Against night’s inky ground they stirred, moulding
Mysterious motion on her human tread,
A swimming action and a drifting march
Like figures moving before eyelids closed:
All as in dreams went slipping, gliding on.

The three move on against the dark spaces of the night, Savitri is made to adjust her human walk to mysterious movements, now a movement as of swimming, now a movement as of drifting, very much like figures moving before closed eyes. Everything goes on slipping and gliding as happens in dreams.

Into the Timeless and Nothingnes

The rock-gate’s heavy walls were left behind;
As if through passages of receding time
The present and past into the Timeless lapsed;
Arrested upon dim adventure’s brink,
The future ended drowned in nothingness.

The heavy walls of the sentinel gates are left behind. The present and the past disappear into the Timeless through the corridors of receding time. Held back on the dim edge of adventure, even the future sinks into nothingness.

Dumb Procession

Amid collapsing shapes they wound obscure;
The fading vestibules of a tenebrous world
Received them, where they seemed to move and yet
Be still, nowhere advancing yet to pass,
A dumb procession a dim picture bounds,
Not conscious forms threading a real scene.

The party wind obscurely amidst collapsing shapes. They step into fast fading halls of a dark world where they appear to be moving and yet to be still, passing and yet not advancing. It is like a mute procession in a dim framed picture rather than living forms weaving through a real scene.

Monstrous Throat Devours

A mystery of terror’s boundlessness,
Gathering its hungry strength the huge pitiless void
Surrounded slowly with its soundless depths,
And monstrous, cavernous, a shapeless throat
Devoured her into its shadowy strangling mass,
The fierce spiritual agony of a dream.

A huge pitiless void, a veritable mystery of unbounded terror, gathers its hungry strength, surrounds Savitri with its silent gulf and through its cavelike, shapeless, monstrous throat, devours her into its dim choking mass. She feels the fierce spiritual agony of a dream.

Darkness Around

A curtain of impenetrable dread,
The darkness hung around her cage of sense
As when the trees have turned to blotted shades
And the last friendly glimmer fades away,
Around a bullock in the forest tied
By hunters closes in no empty night.

Like a veritable curtain of impassable dread, the darkness hangs around her caging in her senses. It resembles the scene of a crowded night closing upon a solitary bullock tied by hunters in a forest and left alone while the trees are fast turning into vague shadowy shapes and the last friendly glimmer of light is fading away.

Thought Unmade

The thought that strives in the world was here unmade;
Its effort it renounced to live and know,
Convinced at last that it had never been;
It perished, all its dream of action done:
This clotted cypher was its dark result.

Thought disintegrates in this realm. It gives up its effort to be and to know, convinced, as it were, that it never really existed. It dreams no more of action, it perishes. This hardened zero is its ultimate dark end.

Sterile Emptiness

In the smothering stress of this stupendous Nought
Mind could not think, breath could not breathe, the soul
Could not remember or feel itself; it seemed
A hollow gulf of sterile emptiness,
A zero oblivious of the sum it closed,
An abnegation of the Maker’s joy
Saved by no wide repose, no depth of peace.

In the engulfing movement of this mighty Nought, mind is unable to think, breath to breathe, the soul to remember or be aware of itself. All looks a vacant gulf of barren emptiness, a zero unaware of what it ends, a denial of the joy of the world-Creator, with no large repose nor deep peace to save the situation.

Refusal of Eternal no

On all that claims here to be Truth and God
And conscious self and the revealing Word
And the creative rapture of the Mind
And Love and Knowledge and heart’s delight, there fell
The immense refusal of the eternal No.

A stupendous denial of the eternal Negation falls on all that claims here on earth to be Truth and God, on the conscious self and the Word of revelation, on the creative delight of the Mind, on Love and Knowledge and the heart’s bliss.

Savitri Vanishes into Shadows

As disappears a golden lamp in gloom
Borne into distance from the eye’s desire,
Into the shadows vanished Savitri.

Like a golden lamp disappearing into gloom, carried away from longing eyes, Savitri vanishes into the shadows.

No Path, No Goal

There was no course, no path, no end or goal:
Visionless she moved amid insensible gulfs,
Or drove through some great black unknowing Waste
Or whirled in a dumb eddy of meeting winds
Assembled by the titan hands of Chance.

There is neither path nor goal. Savitri moves on unseeing amidst unfeeling gulfs, drives through some great black unknowing Waste, is tossed about in the grip of whirling winds that are brought into collision by the powerful hands of chance.

None with Her

There was none with her in the dreadful Vast:
She saw no more the vague tremendous god,
Her eyes had lost their luminous Satyavan.

Yet not for this her spirit failed, but held
More deeply than the bounded senses can
Which grasp externally and find to lose
Its object loved. …

In that dreadful Vast there is none with Savitri; she sees no more the vague, huge god of Death, nor does she any longer behold the luminous Satyavan. Still, her spirit does not fail; it holds its beloved object more securely than the restricted senses can, senses which grasp from the outside and find their object only to lose it.

Intimacy while on Earth

…. So when on earth they lived
She had felt him straying through the glades, the glades
A scene in her, its clefts her being’s vistas
Opening their secrets to his search and joy,
Because to jealous sweetness in her heart
Whatever happy space his cherished feet
Preferred, must be at once her soul embracing
His body, passioning dumbly to his tread.

When they had lived on earth, Savitri had felt Satyavan straying through the glades of her being which revealed their secrets to his search and joy, for in the possessive sweetness of her heart, wherever his beloved feet chose to tread, there, intensely desiring their advent, her soul had rushed to embrace his body.

Abysmal Loneliness

But now a silent gulf between them came
And to abysmal loneliness she fell,
Even from herself cast out, from love remote.

But now there is a silent gulf between her and him. She falls into a bottomless loneliness far removed even from her own self, remote from love.

Travel in Darkness

Long hours, since long it seems when sluggish time
Is measured by the throbs of the soul’s pain,
In an unreal darkness empty and drear
She travelled treading on the corpse of life,
Lost in a blindness of extinguished souls.

Time is felt to pass too slowly when the soul throbs in pain. For such long-seeming hours, Savitri jour-eys in art unreal, vacant and dreadful darkness, walking, as it were, on the corpse of life, lost in a blindness of souls whose light has been put out.

She lives on

Solitary in the anguish of the void
She lived in spite of death, she conquered still;
In vain her puissant being was oppressed:
Her heavy long monotony of pain
Tardily of its fierce self-torture tired.

Alone in the anguish of that void, despite the prevailing death all around, she lives on unconquered. Her powerful being is oppressed in vain. Her heavy, long, monotonous pain slowly gets tired of its self-torture.

Faint

At first a faint inextinguishable gleam,
Pale but immortal, flickered in the gloom
As if a memory came to spirits dead,
A memory that wished to live again,
Dissolved from mind in Nature’s natal sleep.

There flickers a faint gleam in that gloom. The gleam is inextinguishable, pale but immortal. It is as if a memory revives in dead spirits, a memory that seeks to live again though it has been dissolved mind in the brooding sleep of Nature.

Serpentine Darkness

It wandered like a lost ray of the moon
Revealing to the night her soul of dread;
Serpentine in the gleam the darkness lolled,
Its black hoods jewelled with the mystic glow;
Its dull sleek folds shrank back and coiled and slid,
As though they felt all light a cruel pain
And suffered from the pale approach of hope.

This gleam wanders like a straying ray of the moon showing up to the night her soul of dread. In this gleam the darkness is seen to hang like a serpent, with a mystic glow shining like a jewel on its black hoods; its slippery folds shrink back and coil and slide away as if all light were a cruel pain inflicted upon them and they suffered from the pale approach of hope promised by the gleam.

Night Assailed

Night felt assailed her heavy sombre reign;
The splendour of some bright eternity
Threatened with this faint beam of wandering Truth
Her empire of the everlasting Nought.

Night feels her dark reign attacked. The radiance of some bright eternity threatens with this faint gleam of moving Truth her empire of unending Nothingness.

Tenebrous Absolute

Implacable in her intolerant strength
And confident that she alone was true,
She strove to stifle the frail dangerous ray;
Aware of an all-negating immensity
She reared her giant head of Nothingness,
Her mouth of darkness swallowing all that is;
She saw in herself the tenebrous Absolute.

Unyielding in her intolerant strength and confident that she alone not light — is true, the Night tries to smother that frail but dangerous ray. Conscious of an all-negating immensity, she raises her huge head of Nothingness, swallowing with her mouth of darkness all that exists. She beholds in herself the dark Absolute.

Still the Light Prevails

But still the light prevailed and still it grew,
And Savitri to her lost self awoke;
Her limbs refused the cold embrace of death,
Her heart-beats triumphed in the grasp of pain;
Her soul persisted claiming for its joy
The soul of the beloved now seen no more.

In spite of the surge of Night, the light prevails and grows. Savitri awakes to her self which appeared to be lost till now. Her limbs refuse to die, her heart rises above pain; her soul persists in claiming for its joy the soul of beloved Satyavan now no more visible.

Once more she Hears and Sees

Before her in the stillness of the world
Once more she heard the treading of a god,
And out of the dumb darkness Satyavan,
Her husband, grew into a luminous shade.

In that stillness, she hears before her, once again, the tread of the god of Death. And out of that mute darkness, Satyavan’s figure appears again in the form of a lustrous shade.

Death’s Lethal Call

Then a sound pealed through that dead monstrous realm:
Vast like the surge in a tired swimmer’s ears,
Clamouring, a fatal iron-hearted roar,
Death missioned to the night his lethal call.

Then a sound peals through that dead inhuman realm. Huge like the surge of the sea roaring, clamouring and striking the ears of a tired swimmer, the deadly call of Death goes out into that night.

Tomb of Vanity of Life’s Desires

“This is my silent dark immensity,
This is the home of everlasting Night,
This is the secrecy of Nothingness
Entombing the vanity of life’s desires.

Hast thou beheld thy source, O transient heart,
And known from what the dream thou art was made?

In this stark sincerity of nude emptiness
Hopest thou still always to last and love?”

Death speaks:"This is my silent, dark immensity, this is the home of unending Night, this the mystery of Nothingness in which ends all the vanity of life’s desires. O heart that beatest for a while, hast thou now seen thy real source and known from what the dream that thou art was fashioned? And in this sheer, bare emptiness, dost thou still hope to continue to live and love?"

Savitri Refuses to Hear

The Woman answered not. Her spirit refused
The voice of the Night that knew and Death that thought.

In her beginningless infinity
Through her soul’s reaches unconfined she gazed;
She saw the undying fountains of her life,
She knew herself eternal without birth.

Savitri does not reply. Her spirit refuses to listen to the voice of the Night that claims it knows the truth —it speaks to her differently and to Death that enforces his thoughts. She is conscious of the eternal infinity and gazes across the unbounded reaches of her soul; she beholds the deathless springs of her life; she realises that she is eternal without birth.

Death’s Tremendous Gaze

But still opposing her with endless night
Death, the dire god, inflicted on her eyes
The immortal calm of his tremendous gaze:

But still, Death, the dreadful god, opposes Savitri with his endless darkness and imposes his formidable gaze of immortal calm on her eyes. He speaks:

Thy Sorrowful Victory is Brief

“Although thou hast survived the unborn void
Which never shall forgive, while Time endures,
The primal violence that fashioned thought,
Forcing the immobile Vast to suffer and live
This sorrowful victory only hast thou won
To live for a little without Satyavan.

"Thou hast indeed survived the invasion of this unborn void which will never forgive as long as Time lasts — the first creative assault that engendered thought and forced the immobile Vast to live and suffer. But the victory thou hast won — sorrowful as it is — is only to live for a little while and that too without Satyavan.

Vain Labour of Living

What shall the ancient goddess give to thee
Who helps thy heart-beats? Only she prolongs
The nothing dreamed existence and delays
With the labour of living thy eternal sleep.

"What can the ancient goddess who helps thee to live, give to thee? She only prolongs an existence which is but a dream dreamed by nothing; she only delays with the useless labour of living thy sleep eternal in the silence of Death.

Man Erects Myth of God

A fragile miracle of thinking clay,
Armed with illusions walks the child of Time.

To fill the void around he feels and dreads,
The void he came from and to which he goes,
He magnifies his self and names it God.

"Man, the product of Time, a brittle miracle of the thinking clay of matter, moves equipped with illusions galore. He feels acutely the void around him; he is afraid of this void from which he has come and into which he is destined to disappear; to fill this void he exaggerates his own little self and calls it God.

He Calls the Heavens

He calls the heavens to help his suffering hopes.

He sees above him with a longing heart
Bare spaces more unconscious than himself
That have not even his privilege of mind
And empty of all but their unreal blue
And peoples them with bright and merciful powers.

"Man looks to the heavens for help to realise his hopes that are constantly thwarted. He sees above himself, with his heart full of longings, bare spaces which are in fact more unconscious than he is and do not even have a mind which he is privileged to have; they are empty and even the blue that is seen in them is unreal. He imagines that those empty spaces are peopled by bright and merciful powers to whom he can turn for guidance, protection and succour.

Insecurity

For the sea roars around him and earth quakes
Beneath his steps, and fire is at his doors,
And death prowls baying through the woods of life.

Moved by the Presences with which he yearns,
He offers in implacable shrines his soul
And clothes all with the beauty of his dreams.

"Man is hemmed in by threats of disaster: the roaring waves of the sea around, the quaking earth below, fire at his door and death ever on the prowl. Still there are certain supernatural Presences which move him to hope and yearning and he offers his soul to Powers that are unyielding, investing all of them with the beauty he dreams of.

Gods with Sleepless Eyes

The gods who watch the earth with sleepless eyes
And guide its giant stumblings through the void,
Have given to man the burden of his mind;
In his unwilling heart they have lit their fires
And sown in it incurable unrest.

"The gods watch this earth with vigilant, unsleeping eyes’ and guide its huge stumblings, through the void, towards its destiny. They have burdened man with mind and have lit their fires of aspiration in his inert heart that is unwilling to move and soar; they have planted in man the unceasing and incurable unrest that drives him on relentlessly.

Mind a Hunter

His mind is a hunter upon tracks unknown;
Amusing Time with vain discovery,
He deepens with thought the mystery of his fate
And turns to song his laughter and his tears.

"His mind hunts for things on unknown courses. Its discoveries, however, are inconsequential in the long run. He enhances the mystery of his fate with thought and he renders his joys and pains into song.

Man, Cattle of the Gods (I)

His mortality vexing with the immortal’s dreams,
Troubling his transience with the infinite’s breath
They gave him hungers which no food can fill;
He is the cattle of the shepherd gods.

"Man is verily the cattle shepherded by the gods. They harass his mortality with dreams of immortality; they trouble his momentary life with the touch of the infinite; they make him long for things which cannot be attained in any measure.

Man, the Cattle of the Gods (II)

His body the tether with which he is tied,
They cast for fodder grief and hope and joy:
His pasture ground they have fenced with Ignorance.

"His physical body is used by the shepherd gods as a tether for tying him down. For fodder they give him grief, hope and joy. They enclose their cattle in the pasture-ground of Ignorance.

Journey without Goal

Into his fragile undefended breast
They have breathed a courage that is met by death,
They have given a wisdom that is mocked by night,
They have traced a journey that foresees no goal.

"The gods play a cruel game with man. They instill courage in him, but that courage only ends in death. They endow him with wisdom, but the light of that wisdom counts for little against the confronting darkness. They set him a course of journey, but that journey sees no prospect of a goal.

Bound to Gods’ Chariot

Aimless man toils in an uncertain world
Lulled by inconstant pauses of his pain,
Scourged like a beast by the infinite desire,
Bound to the chariot of the dreadful gods.

"Man toils, without an aim, in a world that is ever uncertain, wrongly assured by fickle pauses of his pain; he is whipped like a beast by boundless desire; he is helplessly bound to the moving chariot of the awful gods.

Return to thy Shell

But if thou still canst hope and still wouldst love,
Return to thy body’s shell they tie to earth,
And with thy heart’s little remnants try to live.

Hope not to win back to thee Satyavan.
"But if thou cant hope still, if thou wouldst love still, then go back to thy body which is a shell with which the dreadful gods enchain thee to the earth and try to live with what little remains of thy heart. Do not, however, hope to get back Satyavan to thyself.

Gifts Offered

Yet since thy strength deserves no trivial crown,
Gifts I can give to soothe thy wounded life.

The pacts which transient beings make with fate,
And the wayside sweetness earth-bound hearts would pluck,
These if thy will accepts make freely thine.

Choose a life’s hopes for thy deceiving prize.”

"All the same, since thou hast a strength which deserves to be richly rewarded, I can give thee some gifts to soothe thy wounds — gifts that are like pacts between mortals and fate, like sweet fruits on the roadside which those who are attached to earth would pluck. If thy will would accept them, take these gifts freely. Choose these life’s hopes for thy prize —though it is but a deceptive prize."

Stir of Thoughts

As ceased the ruthless and tremendous Voice,
Unendingly there rose in Savitri
Like moonlit ridges on a shuddering flood
A stir of thoughts out of some silence born
Across the sea of her dumb fathomless heart.

At last she spoke; her voice was heard by Night:

thoughts like bright glimpses which traverse the regions of her mute, deep heart. Finally she speaks. Her voice is heard by the enveloping Darkness.

Death a Mask

“I bow not to thee, O huge mask of Death,
Black lie of night to the cowed soul of man,
Unreal, inescapable end of things,
Thou grim jest played with the immortal spirit.

"O Death, I do not submit to thee. Thou art but a huge mask, a black lie of Darkness revealed to the frightened soul of man; thou art the unreal unavoidable end of things; thou art truly a grim jest played upon the spirit immortal.

I have Survived

Conscious of immortality I walk.

A victor spirit conscious of my force,
Not as a suppliant to thy gates I came:
Unslain I have survived the clutch of Night.

"I move in full consciousness of my immortality. I have not come to thy door as a supplicant, but as a conquering spirit conscious of my force. I have survived — as you see — unslain, the clutch of this Darkness.

My Spirit shall be Strong

My first strong grief moves not my seated mind;
My unwept tears have turned to pearls of strength:
I have transformed my ill-shaped brittle clay
Into the hardness of a statued soul.

Now in the wrestling of the splendid gods
My spirit shall be obstinate and strong
Against the vast refusals of the world.

"My initial strong grief does not move my firm mind; my unshed tears have turned into pearls of strength. I have transformed the brittle ill-formed clay of my nature into the statued hardness of my soul. In combat with the splendid gods, my spirit shall now prove itself to be enduring and strong and prevail against the vast denials of the world.

I Stoop Not

I stoop not with the subject mob of minds
Who run to glean with eager satisfied hands
And pick from its mire mid many trampling feet
Its scornful small concessions to the weak.

"I do not stoop along with the crowd of subjected men who rush to gather with eager contented hands from the mire of the world, mid all the blows and kicks of life, the petty, contemptuous concessions offered to the weak.

Labour of Gods

Mine is the labour of the battling gods:
Imposing on the slow reluctant years
The flaming will that reigns beyond the stars,
They lay the law of Mind on Matter’s works
And win the soul’s wish from earth’s inconscient force.

"I labour like the gods who battle against the hosts of the Adversary; they struggle and impose on the slow, unwilling cycles of time the flaming will of the Supreme that reigns above; they establish the law of Mind in the field of Matter and exact the fulfilment of the wish of the soul from the earth’s inconscient force.

I Demand what Satyavan Desired

First I demand whatever Satyavan,
My husband, waking in the forest’s charm
Out of his long pure childhood’s lonely dreams,
Desired and had not for his beautiful life.

Give, if thou must, or if thou canst, refuse.”

"First I demand whatever Satyavan, in his lonely childhood in the forest, may have dreamed of and longed for but did not get. Give that, if thou must give, or refuse, if thou canst refuse."

Death Assents

Death bowed his head in scornful cold assent,
The builder of this dreamlike earth for man
Who has mocked with vanity all gifts he gave.

Death bows his head in disdainful, cold assent —Death who builds this dream-like earth for man and mocks at him by the ultimate futility of the gifts he gives.

Boons given

Uplifting his disastrous voice he spoke:
“Indulgent to the dreams my touch shall break,
I yield to his blind father’s longing heart
Kingdom and power and friends and greatness lost
And royal trappings for his peaceful age,
The pallid pomps of man’s declining days,
The silvered decadent glories of life’s fall.

Raising his calamitous voice, Death speaks:"I shall be indulgent to the dreams that are normally broken by my touch. I yield to the desire of Satyavan’s blind father for his kingdom, power, friends and greatness, all of which he has lost, — the royal regalia for his peaceful old age, pale pomps of the waning days of man, the embellished, decadent glories of the fall of life.

Sight given

To one who wiser grew by adverse fate,
Goods I restore the deluded soul prefers
To impersonal nothingness’s bare sublime.

The sensuous solace of the light I give
To eyes which could have found a larger realm,
A deeper vision in their fathomless night.

"Adverse fate had made him wiser. But now I shall restore to him all the goods that the soul in delusion prefers to the bare sublimity of an impersonal nothingness.

To his eyes which in their blind darkness could have gained a realm larger and a vision deeper than what is open to normal seeing eyes, I grant the sense-satisfying solace of light. He shall see.

Go back

For that this man desired and asked in vain
While still he lived on earth and cherished hope.

Back from the grandeur of my perilous realms
Go, mortal, to thy small permitted sphere!

Hasten swift-footed, lest to slay thy life
The great laws thou hast violated, moved,
Open at last on thee their marble eyes.”

"This is what Satyavan had desired and hoped for when he lived on earth.

Now, O mortal, draw back from my dangerous realms and return to the small sphere legitimate to thee. Hasten, lest the great laws that thou hast violabd strike at thee."

I Tremble not

But Savitri answered the disdainful Shade:
“World-spirit, I was thy equal spirit born.

I am immortal in my mortality.

I tremble not before the immobile gaze
Of the unchanging marble hierarchies
That look with the stone eyes of Law and Fate.

My soul can meet them with its living fire.

But Savitri answers the contemptuous dark Shade:"O World-Spirit, I was born as a spirit equal to thee. Even in my human mortality, I am immortal. I do not quake before the unmoving look of the unchanging, fixed hierarchical Powers that administer Law and Fate unfeelingly. My soul can front them with its living fire.

Give back Satyavan

Out of thy shadow give me back again
Into earth’s flowering spaces Satyavan
In the sweet transiency of human limbs
To do with him my spirit’s burning will.

I will bear with him the ancient Mother’s load,
I will follow with him earth’s path that leads to God.

"Give me back Satyavan freed from thy dark grasp into the blossoming spaces of earth, in the sweet, though transient, human form so that I may fulfil with him the flaming will of my spirit. With him I shall bear the load of the ancient Mother, Nature, with him I shall follow earth’s road leading to God.

Else I shall Pursue

Else shall the eternal spaces open to me
While round us strange horizons far recede,
Travelling together the immense unknown.

For I who have trod with him the tracts of Time,
Can meet behind his steps whatever night
Or unimaginable stupendous dawn
Breaks on our spirits in the untrod Beyond.

Wherever thou leadst his soul I shall pursue.”

"If thou wilt not give, then I shall tread the immortal spaces opening before me while strange horizons recede away, travelling together with him this immensitude of the Unknown. With him I have walked the roads of Time and I can, following his steps, meet whatever dark night or unimaginable mighty dawn breaks upon our spirits in the untrodden Beyond. Wherever thou leadest his soul, I shall pursue persistently."

Her claim Opposed

But to her claim opposed, implacable,
Insisting on the immutable Decree,
Insisting on the immitigable Law
And the insignificance of created things,
Out of the rolling wastes of night there came
Born from the enigma of the unknowable depths
A voice of majesty and appalling scorn.

In answer, a majestic and scornful voice comes out of the unending wastes of the dark, born from the mystery of the unknowable depths. It opposes her claim and insists upon the unchangeable Decree of Death, upon the irreducibility of Law and upon the transience of created things.

Almighty cry of Death

As when the storm-haired Titan-striding sea
Throws on a swimmer its tremendous laugh
Remembering all the joy its waves had drowned,
So from the darkness of the sovereign night
Against the Woman’s boundless heart arose
The almighty cry of universal Death:

The all-powerful cry of universal Death arises out of the darkness of the pervading night, against the boundless heart of Savitri like the storm-tossed sea casting its tremendous wave of laughter on a swimmer, remembering all the joy of life its waves have drowned.

I Create and I Destroy

“Hast thou god-wings or feet that tread my stars,
Frail creature with the courage that aspires,
Forgetting thy bounds of thought, thy mortal role?

Their orbs were coiled before thy soul was formed.

I, Death, created them out of my void;
All things I have built in them and I destroy.

I made the worlds my net, each joy a mesh.

"Hast thou the wings of the gods or the feet that can tread my skies, O frail creature with courage that soars forgetful of the limits of thy thought, of thy role that is mortal? Those bounds were forged before thy soul was fashioned. I created them out of my void, within them I have built all things and within them I destroy. I have made the worlds my net and every joy is a mesh of that net.

Flee

A Hunger amorous of its suffering prey,
Life that devours, my image see in things.

Mortal, whose spirit is my wandering breath,
Whose transience was imagined by my smile,
Flee clutching thy poor gains to thy trembling breast
Pierced by my pangs Time shall not soon appease.

"A consuming Hunger’ that passionately loves its suffering prey, Life that eats up things in order to live —this is my image everywhere; regard that.

O mortal, my casual breath forms thy spirit; my smile fancies thy transience. Clutch to thy quaking breast the poor gains I have given to thee and flee; thy breast pierced by my pangs cannot soon be healed by Time.

Do not Awaken the Furies

Blind slave of my deaf force whom I compel
To sin that I may punish, to desire
That I may scourge thee with despair and grief
And thou come bleeding to me at the last,
Thy nothingness recognised, my greatness known,
Turn nor attempt forbidden happy fields
Meant for the souls that can obey my law,
Lest in their sombre shrines thy tread awake
From their uneasy iron-hearted sleep
The Furies who avenge fulfilled desire.

"Thou art a blind slave of my deaf force, whom I compel to deviate so that I may punish, whom I compel to desire so that I may whip thee with despair and grief at the non-fulfilment of thy desire and thou be forced to come to me at last bleeding, recognising thy nothingness, knowing my greatness. Do not try to enter the happy realms that are meant only for the souls that observe my law in case thy footsteps might awaken from their restless, stony, unfeeling sleep the spirits in their dismal shrines who cannot tolerate and will avenge every desire that is fulfilled.

Tireless Wrath

Dread lest in skies where passion hoped to live,
The Unknown’s lightnings start and terrified,
Lone, sobbing, hunted by the hounds of heaven,
A wounded and forsaken soul, thou flee
Through the long torture of the centuries,
Nor many lives exhaust the tireless Wrath
Hell cannot slake nor heaven’s mercy assuage.

"Fear, lest instead of hopeful passion the lightnings of the Unknown start and thou art compelled to flee, terrified, alone, sobbing, pursued by the hounds of heaven, wounded and forsaken, through the long torture of centuries, under the unyielding Wrath that thou hast provoked which many lives cannot exhaust and even the sufferings of hell cannot satisfy nor the mercy of heaven lessen.

Depart in Peace

I will take from thee the black eternal grip:
Clasping in thy heart thy fate’s exiguous doles
Depart in peace, if peace for man is just.”

"I shall remove my grip over thee. Grasp the pittance allowed by thy fate (which I govern) and go back in peace — if at all the human kind deserves peace."

God Imagined by Night

But Savitri answered meeting scorn with scorn,
The mortal woman to the dreadful Lord:
“Who is this God imagined by thy night,
Contemptuously creating worlds disdained,
Who made for vanity the brilliant stars?

Savitri, the mortal woman replies to dreadful Death with equal scorn:"Who is this God concocted by thy darkness, who creates in contempt worlds that he looks down upon, who has formed these brilliant stars only to feed his vanity?

Not my God

Not he who has reared his temple in my thoughts
And made his sacred floor my human heart.

My God is Will and triumphs in his paths,
My God is Love and sweetly suffers all.

To him I have offered hope for sacrifice
And gave my longings as a sacrament.

Who shall prohibit or hedge in his course,
The wonderful, the charioteer, the swift?

"Certainly that is not the God who has built his temple in my thoughts and made of my human heart his sacred floor. My God is Will that ever triumphs, my God is Love that suffers all happily. To him have I given my hope in, sacrifice and my longings as a sacred ceremonial gesture. Who can stop or limit his course, he who is the wonderful, the charioteer who leads, the swift one?

My God

A traveller of the million roads of life,
His steps familiar with the lights of heaven
Tread without pain the sword-paved courts of hell;
There he descends to edge eternal joy.

Love’s golden wings have power to fan thy void:
The eyes of love gaze starlike through death’s night,
The feet of love tread naked hardest worlds.

He labours in the depths, exults on the heights;
He shall remake thy universe, O Death.”

"My God travels on the myriad roads of life, equally familiar with the lights of heaven and the sword-studded floors of hell which he walks without pain; he descends into hell to enhance by contrast his eternal joy. The golden wings of his Love have it in their power to soothe thy void; his eyes of Love gaze like stars through thy dark night; his feet of Love tread bare the hardest worlds. He labours in the depths, he glories on the heights. My God shall re-form thy universe. O Death."

Death Answers

She spoke and for a while no voice replied,
While still they travelled through the trackless night
And still that gleam was like a pallid eye
Troubling the darkness with its doubtful gaze.

Then once more came a deep and perilous pause
In that unreal journey through blind Nought;
Once more a Thought, a Word in the void arose
And Death made answer to the human soul:

For a while no voice replies to Savitri. They go on journeying through that pathless dark and that gleam, like a pale eye, continues to disturb the darkness with its hesitant gaze.Then once again there is a deep and dangerous pause in that unreal journey through the blind Nought. Once more arises a Thought, a Word in the void and Death answers the human soul of Savitri.

Lure of Bliss

“What is thy hope? to what dost thou aspire?

This is thy body’s sweetest lure of bliss,
Assailed by pain a frail precarious form,
To please for a few years thy faltering sense
With honey of physical longings and the heart’s fire
And a vain oneness seeking to embrace
The brilliant idol of a fugitive hour.

"What dost thou hope for, to what dost thou aspire?

Thy body is but a frail precarious form attacked by pain. And its sweetest lure of bliss is to seek to satisfy its stumbling sense for a few years with the honey of physical desires, the intensities of the heart and the seeking of a vain feeling of oneness to last a glittering hour snatched from the jaws of death.

Thou a Glorious Dream

And thou, what art thou, soul, thou glorious dream
Of brief emotions made and glittering thoughts,
A thin dance of fireflies speeding through the night,
A sparkling ferment in life’s sunlit mire?

"And what art thou, O soul, but a glorious dream made of brief emotions and glittering thoughts, a flimsy dance of fireflies fleeting through the night, a ferment that sparkles for a while in the sunlit mire of life?

Death only Lasts

Wilt thou claim immortality, O heart,
Crying against the eternal witnesses
That thou and he are endless powers and last?

Death only lasts and the inconscient Void.

I only am eternal and endure.

"Wilt thou claim to be immortal, O Savitri, proclaim before the eternal witnesses that thou and Satyavan are eternal powers and will last for ever? Only Death lasts, the inconscient Void lasts.I, Death, only am eternal, I only endure.

I am He

I am the shapeless formidable Vast,
I am the emptiness that men call Space,
I am a timeless Nothingness carrying all,
I am the Illimitable, the mute Alone.

I, Death, am He; there is no other God.

"I am the featureless, mighty Vast; I am the emptiness that goes by the name of Space; I am an eternal Nothingness carrying all; I am the Boundless, the silent Alone — nothing else exists. I, Death, am God. There is truly no other God.

Death the Supreme

All from my depths are born, they live by death;
All to my depths return and are no more.

I have made a world by my inconscient Force.

My force is Nature that creates and slays
The hearts that hope, the limbs that long to live.

I have made man her instrument and slave,
His body I made my banquet, his life my food.

Man has no other help but only Death;
He comes to me at his end for rest and peace.

"All are born from my depths; all live by me; all return to my depths and cease. By my inconscient Force have I created this world. My force is Nature that creates and slays the hearts that dare to hope, the limbs that desire to live. I, Death, have made man the instrument and slave of Nature. I have made of his body my banquet, of his life my food. Man can find no other help except in death: at the end, he has to come to me for rest and peace.

Death thy Refuge

I, Death, am the one refuge of thy soul.

The gods to whom man prays can help not man;
They are my imaginations and my moods
Reflected in him by illusion’s power.

That which thou seest as thy immortal self
Is a shadowy icon of my infinite,
Is Death in thee dreaming of eternity.

"O Savitri, know that I am the ultimate refuge of thy soul. The gods to whom man prays cannot help him; for the gods are only my imaginations, my moods reflected in man by the power of Maya, illusion, —they do not exist in fact. That which thou seest as thy immortal self is nothing but a shadowy image of my infinity; it is myself, Death, dreaming in thee of eternity.

I have no Form

I am the Immobile in which all things move,
I am the nude Inane in which they cease:
I have no body and no tongue to speak,
I commune not with human eye and ear;
Only thy thought gave a figure to my void.

Because, O aspirant to divinity,
Thou calledst me to wrestle with thy soul,
I have assumed a face, a form, a voice.

"I am the Moveless in which all moves, I am the bare emptiness in which all ceases. Body I have none, nor tongue to speak. The human eye cannot see me nor the human ear hear. It is thy thought which has given a form to my void. O aspirant to divinity, because thou hast called me for combat with thy soul, I have assumed a face, a form, a voice; in truth I have none of these.

The one Lives for ever

But if there were a being witnessing all,
How should he help thy passionate desire?

Aloof he watches sole and absolute,
Indifferent to thy cry in nameless calm.

His being is pure, unwounded, motionless, one.

One endless watches the inconscient scene
Where all things perish, as the foam the stars.

The One lives for ever. …

"Even if there were a being witnessing all this that passes, how would he help thy passionate desire? He watches aloof, alone, absolute, unmoved by thy cry in his nameless calm. His being is pure, unscarred, unmoving, one.

A boundless One watches this inconscient scene where all perishes, where the stars end up in foam. The One alone lives for ever.

The alone

… There no Satyavan
Changing was born and there no Savitri
Claims from brief life her bribe of joy. There love
Came never with his fretful eyes of tears,
Nor Time is there nor the vain vasts of Space.

It wears no living face, it has no name,
No gaze, no heart that throbs, it asks no second
To aid its being or to share its joys.

It is delight immortally alone.

"There where the One is, Satyavan of the changing form is not born nor is Savitri there claiming her bribe of joy from transient life. There love does not come with distressed tears; there neither Time nor Space exists. That one does not wear a living face, carries no name; it has neither the eyes that gaze nor the heart that throbs; it does not seek a partner to aid it or to share its joys. It is a self-delight, immortal, alone.

Be alone

If thou desirest immortality,
Be then alone sufficient to thy soul:
Live in thyself; forget the man thou lov’st.

My last grand death shall rescue thee from life;
Then shalt thou rise into thy unnamed source.”

"Hence, shouldst thou desire immortality, thou must be alone, sufficient to thyself, living in thyself, for getting the man thou lovest. And when death comes to thee — my last great act — it shall rescue thee from thraldom to life and thou shalt ascend to thy nameless Source."

I Reason not

But Savitri replied to the dread Voice:
“O Death, who reasonest, I reason not,
Reason that scans and breaks, but cannot build
Or builds in vain because she doubts her work.

I am, I love, I see, I act, I will.”

Savitri replies to the awesome Voice:"O Death, thou reasonest; I do not reason. Reason counts, measures and breaks up; she cannot build things; even if she builds, what she builds cannot last because she goes on doubting while she works and thus her work is self-defeating. I am just natural. I exist naturally, I love naturally, I see naturally, I act naturally, I will naturally."

Cease to Love

Death answered her, one deep surrounding cry:
“Know also. Knowing, thou shalt cease to love
And cease to will, delivered from thy heart,
So shalt thou rest for ever and be still,
Consenting to the impermanence of things.”

Death replies with a deep cry that echoes round her:"That is not enough. Thou must also know the truth of things. When thou knowest, then shalt thou cease to love and cease to will — knowing that it is vain to do so — and thus absolved from the impulsions of the heart, thou shalt rest for ever and be still, accepting the transience of all things."

Love Knows

But Savitri replied for man to Death:
“When I have loved for ever, I shall know.

Love in me knows the truth all changings mask.

I know that knowledge is a vast embrace:
I know that every being is myself,
In every heart is hidden the myriad One.

Savitri replies to Death on behalf of mankind:

"True, I should know. But I shall truly know only when I have loved for ever. The love in me knows the real truth that is veiled by all the changes that take place.

I know that knowledge comprehends all in a vast embrace. I know well that there is no real division between myself and others; every being is essentially myself. For in every one, in each heart is concealed the manifold one.

My coming a Wave from God

I know the calm Transcendent bears the world,
The veiled Inhabitant, the silent Lord:
I feel his secret act, his intimate fire;
I hear the murmur of the cosmic Voice.

I know my coming was a wave from God.

For all his suns were conscient in my birth,
And one who loves in us came veiled by death.

Then man was born among the monstrous stars
Dowered with a mind and heart to conquer thee.”

"I know too that the calm Transcendent above bears this world; he is the veiled Inhabitant here in each form; he is the silent Lord of all. I feel his secret action, his intimate fire of will; I hear the sound of his Voice pervading the Cosmos.

I know that my coming to earth was a surge from the Being of God; for all his suns — centres of his radiation — were conscious when I was born; and he who loves all came in us veiled by death. It was then that man was born among these huge stellar systems, endowed with a mind and heart that would help to conquer thee, O Death."

Death answers Not

In the eternity of his ruthless will
Sure of his empire and his armoured might,
Like one disdaining violent helpless words
From victim lips Death answered not again.

Sure of his empire and his mailed strength, in the constancy of his ruthless will, Death does not answer again like one who scorns the violent but helpless words of protest from his victim.

His Sombre Face

He stood in silence and in darkness wrapped,
A figure motionless, a shadow vague,
Girt with the terrors of his secret sword.

Half-seen in clouds appeared a sombre face;
Night’s dusk tiara was his matted hair,
The ashes of the pyre his forehead’s sign.

He stands there silent, wrapped in darkness — a motionless figure, a vague shadow, emanating the terrors of his secret sword. His dismal face is half-seen in the clouds; night’s dusk forms, as it were, a crown on his matted hair and the ashes of the pyre, the sign on his forehead, bhasma.

Journey Resumed

Once more a Wanderer in the unending Night,
Blindly forbidden by dead vacant eyes,
She travelled through the dumb unhoping vasts.

Around her rolled the shuddering waste of gloom,
Its swallowing emptiness and joyless death
Resentful of her thought and life and love.

Through the long fading night by her compelled,
Gliding half-seen on their unearthly path,
Phantasmal in the dimness moved the three.

Once again Savitri travels through those dumb hope-bereft vasts, in the endless Night, though forbidden blindly by dead vacant eyes around. All around her rolls the shudder-causing waste of gloom, its engulfing emptiness and chill death, resenting her thought and life and love.

The three of them — Satyavan, Death and Savitri — move on in that dimness, phantomlike, compelled by the will of Savitri, through the long fading night, gliding half-seen on their unearthly path.