Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

SABCL 26

Fragment ID: 7942

Q: A long time ago, you wrote to me that the Overmind has two levels – the intuitive and the gnostic. There are surely several passages in your own poetry as well as in the Upanishads and the Gita that sustain an inspiration from the former; but has no poetry ever come from the Overmind proper which is turned towards the full supramental Gnosis? Do you remember anything either in Sanskrit or in your own work which derives from there? If not, is it possible to give some idea as to what quality of rhythm, language and substance would constitute the difference between the expression of the Overmind Intuition and the Overmind Gnosis? Those four lines I quoted to you from yourself the other day – where do they hail from? –

Arms taking to a voiceless supreme delight,

Life that meets the Eternal with close breast,

An unwalled mind dissolved in the Infinite,

Force one with unimaginable rest¹.

A: It is really very difficult for me to say anything in this respect about my own poetry; there is too complex a working of the Consciousness for it to be possible for me to classify and define. As for the Overmind Gnosis, I cannot yet say anything – I am familiar with its workings, but they are not easily definable or describable and, as for poetry I have not yet observed sufficiently to say whether it enters in anywhere or not. I should expect its intervention to be extremely rare even as a touch; but I refer at present all higher Overmind intervention to the Overmind Intuition in order to avoid any risk of overstatement. In the process of overmental transformation what I have observed is that the Overmind first takes up the illumined and higher mind and intellect (thinking, perceiving and reasoning intelligence) into itself and modifies itself to suit the operation – the result is what may be called a mental Overmind – then it lifts these lower movements and the intuitive mind together into a higher reach of itself, forming there the Overmind Intuition, and then all that into the Overmind Gnosis awaiting the supramental transformation. The Overmind “touch” on the Higher Mind and Illumined Mind can thus raise towards the O.I. or to the O.G. or leave in the M.O.; but estimating at a glance as I have to do, it is not easy to be quite precise. I may have to revise my estimates later on a little, though not perhaps very appreciably, when I am able to look at things in a more leisurely way and fix the misty lines which often tend to fade away, being an indefinable border.

3-5-1937

Q: I said to X and Y that it has been a habit with me to reread and repeat and hum lines which I have felt or known to have come from very high sources. I mentioned your recent poems as my aid to drawing inspiration from the Overhead planes. I quoted also the famous lines from other poets which have derived from the highest levels. Y begged me to type for her all the lines of this character from your poems. I have chosen the following:

1. O marvel bird with the burning wings of light and the unbarred lids that look beyond all space...

2. Lost the titan winging of the thought.

3. Arms taking to a voiceless supreme delight,

Life that meets the Eternal with close breast,

An unwalled mind dissolved in the Infinite,

Force one with unimaginable rest.

4. My consciousness climbed like a topless hill...

5. He who from Time’s dull motion escapes and thrills

Rapt thoughtless, wordless into the Eternal’s breast,

Unrolls the form and sign of being,

Seated above in the omniscient Silence.

6. Calm faces of the gods on backgrounds vast

Bringing the marvel of the infinitudes...

7. A silent unnamed emptiness content

Either to fade in the Unknowable

Or thrill with the luminous seas of the Infinite.

8. Crossing power-swept silences rapture-stunned,

Climbing high far ethers eternal-sunned...

9. I have drunk the Infinite like a giant’s wine.

10. My soul unhorizoned widens to measureless sight...

11. Rose of God like a blush of rapture on Eternity’s face,

Rose of Love, ruby depth of all being, fire-passion of Grace!

Arise from the heart of the yearning that sobs in Nature’s abyss:

Make earth the home of the Wonderful and life beatitude’s kiss.

I shan’t ask you to tell me in detail the sources of all these lines – but what do you think in general of my choice? Only for one quotation I must crave the favour of your closer attention. Please do try to tell me something about it, for I like it so much that I cannot remain without knowing all that can be known: it is, of course. Number 3 here. I consider these lines the most satisfying I have ever read: poetically as well as spiritually, you have written others as great – but what I mean to say is that the whole essence of the truth of life is given by them and every cry in the being seems answered. So be kind enough to take a little trouble and give me an intimate knowledge of them. I’ll be very happy to know their sources and the sort of enthousiasmo you had when writing them. How exactly did they come into being?

A: The choice is excellent. I am afraid I couldn’t tell you in detail the sources, though I suppose they all belong to the Overhead inspiration. In all I simply remained silent and allowed the lines to come down shaped or shaping themselves on the way – I don’t know that I know anything else about it. All depends on the stress of the enthousiasmos, the force of the creative thrill and largeness of the wave of its Ananda, but how is that describable or definable? What is prominent in No. 3 is a certain calm, deep and intense spiritual emotion taken up by the spiritual vision that sees exactly the state or experience and gives it its exact revelatory words. It is an Overmind vision and experience and condition that is given a full power of expression by the word and the rhythm – there is a success in “embodying” them or at least the sight and emotion of them which gives the lines their force.

4-5-1937

¹ “The Life Heavens”, Collected Poems (Centenary Edition, 1972), p. 575.

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