Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

CWSA.- Volume 2

Part Seven. Pondicherry, c. 1927 – 1947
Nonsense and “Surrealist” Verse

Surrealist

I heard¹ a foghorn shouting at a sheep,

And oh the sweet sound made me laugh and weep

But ah², the sheep was on the hither shore

Of the little less and the ever-never more.

I sprang on its back; it jumped into the sea.

I was near to the edges of eternity.

Then suddenly the foghorn blared again.

There was no sheep – it had perished of ear pain.

I took a boat and steered to the Afar

Hoping to colonise the polar star.

But in the boat there was a dangerous goose

Whom some eternal idiot had let loose.

To this wild animal I said not “Bo!”

But it was not because I did not know.

Full soon I was on shore with dreadful squeals

And the fierce biped cackling at my heels.

Alarmed I ran into a lion’s den

And after me ran three thousand armoured men.

The lion bolted through his own back door

And set up a morose dissatisfied roar.

At this my courage rose; I grew quite brave

And shoved myself into a tiger’s cave.

The tiger snarled; I thought it best instead

To don my pyjamas and go to bed.

But the tiger had a strained objecting face,

So I turned my eyes away from his grimace.

At night the beast began my back to claw

And growled out that I was his brother-in-law.

I rose and thought it best to go away

To a doctor’s house: besides ’twas nearly day.

The doctor shook his head and cried “For a back

Pepper and salt are the remedy, alack.”

But I objected to his condiments

And thought the doctor had but little sense.

Then I returned to my own little cot

For really things were now extremely hot.

Then fierily the world cracked Nazily down

And I looked about to find my dressing gown.

I was awake (I had tumbled on the floor).

A shark was hammering at³ my front-door.

Earlier edition of this work: Sri Aurobindo Birth Century Library: Set in 30 volumes.- Volume 5.- Collected Poems.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Asram, 1972.- 625 p.

¹ 1972 ed. SABCL, vol.5: have heard

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² 1972 ed. SABCL, vol.5: alas

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³ 1972 ed. SABCL, vol.5: hammering away at

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