52: A summons from her being’s summit came

A Spiritual Biography of Savitri

 

As in the vigilance of the sleepless night

Through the slow heavy-footed silent hours,

Repressing in her bosom its load of grief,

She sat staring at the dumb tread of Time

And the approach of ever-nearing Fate,

A summons from her being's summit came,

A sound, a call that broke the seals of Night.

 

Above her brows where will and knowledge meet

A mighty Voice invaded mortal space.

 

It seemed to come from inaccessible heights

And yet was intimate with all the world

And knew the meaning of the steps of Time

And saw eternal destiny's changeless scene

Filling the far prospect of the cosmic gaze.

 

As the Voice touched, her body became a stark

And rigid golden statue of motionless trance,

A stone of God lit by an amethyst soul.

 

Around her body's stillness all grew still:

Her heart listened to its slow measured beats,

Her mind renouncing thought heard and was mute:

 

“Why camest thou to this dumb deathbound earth,

This ignorant life beneath indifferent skies

Tied like a sacrifice on the altar of Time,

O spirit, O immortal energy,

If 'twas to nurse grief in a helpless heart

Or with hard tearless eyes await thy doom?

Arise, O soul, and vanquish Time and Death.”

 

But Savitri's heart replied in the dim night:

 

“My strength is taken from me and given to Death,

Why should I lift my hands to the shut heavens

Or struggle with mute inevitable Fate

Or hope in vain to uplift an ignorant race

Who hug their lot and mock the saviour Light

And see in Mind Wisdom's sole tabernacle,

In its harsh peak and its inconscient base

A rock of safety and an anchor of sleep?

 

Is there a God whom any cry can move?

 

He sits in peace and leaves the mortal's strength

Impotent against his calm omnipotent Law

And Inconscience and the almighty hands of Death.

 

What need have I, what need has Satyavan

To avoid the black meshed net, the dismal door,

Or call a mightier Light into life's closed room,

A greater Law into man's little world?

 

Why should I strive with earth's unyielding laws

Or stave off death's inevitable hour?

 

This surely is best to pactise with my fate

And follow close behind my lover's steps

And pass through night from twilight to the sun

Across the tenebrous river that divides

The adjoining parishes of earth and heaven.

 

Then could we lie inarmed breast upon breast,

Untroubled by thought, untroubled by our hearts,

Forgetting man and life and time and its hours,

Forgetting eternity's call, forgetting God.”

 

The Voice replied: “Is this enough, O spirit?

 

And what shall thy soul say when it wakes and knows

The work was left undone for which it came?

 

Or is this all for thy being born on earth

Charged with a mandate from eternity,

A listener to the voices of the years,

A follower of the footprints of the gods,

To pass and leave unchanged the old dusty laws?

 

Shall there be no new tables, no new Word,

No greater light come down upon the earth

Delivering her from her unconsciousness,

Man's spirit from unalterable fate?

 

Cam'st thou not down to open the doors of Fate,

The iron doors that seemed for ever closed,

And lead man to truth's wide and golden road

That runs through finite things to eternity?

 

Is this then the report that I must make,

My head bowed with shame before the Eternal's seat,—

His power he kindled in thy body has failed,

His labourer returns, her task undone?”

 

Then Savitri's heart fell mute, it spoke no word.

 

 

Savitri, pp. 474-76