Nirodbaran

Correspondence with Sri Aurobindo

Second Series

2. Art and Literature

Poetic Qualities (I)

  My life is veiled in a sleep of light,

A hush that nothing breaks;

The world before my inward sight

Into pure beauty wakes.

Life that is deep and wonder-vast,

Lost in a breath of sound;

The bubbling shadows have been cast

From its heart's timeless round.

In its lulled silver stream now shines

A lustrous smile of God

Whose brilliantly curved outlines,

Flashing on the memory-trod

Caverns of slumbering earth, there bring

A glow of the Infinite,

While my soul's diamond voices wing

Into a heaven of light.

Guru, I fear this is only a sprat!

It is not a sprat, sir; it is a goldfish.   You seem to be weak in poetical zoology. It is perfect, except for the one fault you have detected. The only alterations (except the “pure”) I find needful are meant to obviate that defect, by going back to “my”, so connecting the first and last lines (also aided by the repetition of Light) and making the rest appear as closely connected with it. Like that it makes a very well-built and finely inspired poem. If you can produce more sprats like that, there will be much wealth in your fisheries. It is much better than the other recent ones, except the stress poem – nothing decorative, – all there!

30.03.1938