Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

SABCL - Volume 5

II. Sonnets
Early Period

Transiit, non Periit

(My grandfather, Rajnarayan¹ Bose, died September 1899)

Not in annihilation lost, nor given

To darkness art thou fled from us and light,

O strong and sentient spirit; no mere heaven

Of ancient joys, no silence eremite

Received thee; but the omnipresent Thought

Of which thou wast a part and earthly hour,

Took back its gift. Into that splendour caught

Thou hast not lost thy special brightness. Power

Remains with thee and the old genial force

Unseen for blinding light, not darkly lurks:

As when a sacred river in its course

Dives into ocean, there its strength abides

Not less because with vastness wed and works

Unnoticed in the grandeur of the tides.

Later edition of this work: The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo.- Set in 37 volumes.- Volume 2.- Collected Poems.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2009.- 751 p.

¹ 2009 ed. CWSA, vol.2: Rajnarain

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