Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

CWSA.- Volume 2

Part Two. Baroda
Sonnets from Manuscripts, c. 1900 – 1901

Rose, I have loved

Rose, I have loved thy beauty, as I love

The dress that thou hast worn, the transient grass,

O’er which thy happy careless footsteps move,

The yet-thrilled waysides that have watched¹ thee pass.

Soul, I have loved thy sweetness as men love

The necessary air they crave to breathe,

The sunlight lavished from the skies above,

And firmness of the earth their steps beneath.

But were that beauty all, my love might cease

Like love of weaker spirits; were’t thy charm

And grace of soul, mine might with age decrease

Or find in Death a silence and a term,

But rooted in² the unnameable in thee

Shall triumph and transcend eternity.

Earlier edition of this work: Sri Aurobindo Birth Century Library: Set in 30 volumes.- Volume 27.- Supplement.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Asram, 1972.- 511 p.

¹ seen (the variant is mentioned in 1972 ed. SABCL, vol.27)

Back

² 1972 ed. SABCL, vol.27: to

Back