Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume 2. 1936

Letter ID: 1782

Sri Aurobindo — Nirodbaran Talukdar

November 21, 1936

Guru, O Guru,

My head, my head

And the damned fever!

I am half-dead!

With pain and pressure

But blessed liver

Functions quite well,

Please send the others

To hell, oh to hell!

Cheer up! Things might have been so much worse. Just think if you had been a Spaniard in Madrid or a German Communist in a concentration camp! Imagine that and then you will be quite cheerful with only a cold and headache. So

Throw off the cold,

Damn the fever.

Be sprightly and bold

And live for ever.

What’s to be done? How to drop it? Is it the blessed cold only or any Force to boot that is causing havoc in the head?

I don’t know of any Force. Do you think it is some pressure making the difficulty in the head ooze out of it? If so –

For it started, you know, on the very night I came from the Mother...

Receptivity?

Very funny that every time I make a resolution regarding poetry or sadhana, something happens and ties me down. Why?

Probably the adverse forces get frightened and put in an undercut or overcut to knock you out of tune.

I was proud that I was immune to illness! But a mere cold pulls me down, and that too at Darshan time! Again Fate, Sir! There is a proverb in Bengali which says that one who is unlucky, is unlucky everywhere; even in a নেমন্তন্ন¹ he doesn’t get anything. I hope you remember the familiar word নেমন্তন্ন!

I do, though it belongs to the far-off past for me.

¹ nemantanna: an invitation for a feast.

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