Canto 6Notes

Book 16. Part Seven - Pondicherry Circa 1927 – 1947

(From Letters of the Author)

THE BIRD OF FIRE — TRANCE

These two poems are in the nature of metrical experiments. The

first is a kind of compromise between the stress system and the

5foot measure. The stanza is of four lines, alternately of twelve

and ten stresses. The second and fourth line in each stanza can

be read as a ten-foot line of mixed iambs and anapaests, the first

and third, though a similar system subject to replacement of a

foot anywhere by a single-syllable half-foot could be applied,

10are still mainly readable by stresses.

The other poem is an experiment in the use of quantita-

tive foot measures not following any existing model, but freely

invented. It is a four-line stanza reading alternately

⌣

15⌣| ⌣

⌣|

⌣

⌣| ⌣

20|

and

⌣

| ⌣

⌣| ⌣⌣

25|

It could indeed be read otherwise, in several ways, but read

in the ordinary way of accentual feet it would lose all lyrical

quality and the soul of its rhythm.

The Bird of Fire is the living vehicle of the gold fire of the

30Divine Light and the white fire of the Divine Tapas and the

crimson fire of Divine Love — and everything else of the Divine

Consciousness.

SHIVA — The Inconscient Creator

The quantitative metre of Trance is suited only for a very brief

35lyrical poem. For longer poems I have sought to use it as a base

but to liberate it by the introduction of an ample number of

modulations which allow a fairly free variation of the rhythm

without destroying the consistency of the underlying rhythmic

measure. This is achieved in Shiva by allowing as the main mod-

40ulations (1) a paeon anywhere in place of an amphibrach, (2) the

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substitution of a long for a short syllable either in the first or

the last syllable of an amphibrach, at will, thus substituting

a bacchius or an antibacchius, (3) the substitution of a dactyl

45for an initial amphibrach, (4) the substitution of a long instead

of short syllable in the middle of the final anapaest, both this

and the ultimate syllable to be in that case stressed in reading,

e.g.,

deathless |and lo

50|

ne he

ad —

a bacchius replacing the anapaest.

55The suppression of the full value of long syllables to make

them figure as metrical shorts has to be avoided in quantitative

metre.

Scan:

A˘ fa

60_

ce o˘n | the˘ co

ld di

65re | mou

nta˘in pea

70Gra

nd a˘nd sti

ll; | i˘ts li

75_

nes whi

te | a˘nd au

80ste

85tch wi˘th the˘ | u˘nmea

su˘red | sno

wy˘ strea

90_

tti˘ng hea

95_

v|e˘n, i˘mpla

ca˘|ble˘ a˘nd shee

100r.

The Inconscient as the source and author of all material

creation is one of the main discoveries of modern psychology,

but it agrees with the idea of a famous Vedic hymn. In the

Upanishads, Prajna, the Master of Sushupti, is the Ishwara and

105therefore the original Creator out of a superconscient sleep. The

idea of the poem is that this creative Inconscient also is Shiva

creating here life in matter out of an apparently inconscient

material trance as from above he creates all the worlds (not

the material only) from a superconscient trance. The reality is a

110supreme Consciousness — but that is veiled by the appearance

on one side of the superconscient sleep, on the other of the

material Inconscience. Here the emphasis is on the latter; the

superconscient is only hinted at, not indicated, — it is the Infinity

out of which comes the revealing Flame.

115Pondicherry, c. 1927–1947

THE LIFE HEAVENS

Further modulations have been introduced in this poem — a

greater use is made of tetrasyllabic feet such as paeons, epitrites,

di-iambs, double trochees, ionics and, once only, the antispast

120— and in a few places the foot of three long syllables (molossus)

has been used, and in others a foot extending to five syllables

(e.g., De˘li

ve˘red fro˘m gri

125_

ef).

Scan:

A˘ li

130fe o˘f | i˘nte

nsi˘ti˘es | wi

de, i˘mmu

135_

Floa

ts be˘hi

140_

nd | the˘ ea

rth a˘nd | he˘r li

145fe-fre

A˘ ma

150gi˘c o˘f | rea

lms ma

ste˘red by˘ | spe

155_

ll a˘nd ru

ne,

Gra

160_

ndi˘o

se, bli

165ss|fu˘l, co

lou˘red, | i˘ncre˘a

te.

170There were two places in which at the time of writing there

did not seem to me to be a satisfactory completeness and the

addition of a stanza seemed to be called for — one at the end of

the description of the Life Heavens, a stanza which would be a

closing global description of the essence of the vital Heavens, the

175other (less imperatively called for) in the utterance of the Voice.

There it is no doubt very condensed, but it cannot be otherwise. I

thought, however, that one stanza might be added hinting rather

than stating the connection between the two extremes. The con-

nection is between the Divine suppressed in its opposites and the

180Divine eternal in its own unveiled and undescended nature. The

idea is that the other worlds are not evolutionary but typal and

each presents in a limited perfection some aspect of the Infinite,

but each complete, perfectly satisfied in itself, not asking or

aspiring for anything else, for self-exceeding of any kind. That

185aspiration, on the contrary, is self-imposed on the imperfection

of Earth; the very fact of the Divine being there, but suppressed

in its phenomenal opposites, compels an effort to arrive at the

unveiled Divine — by ascent, but also by a descent of the Divine

Perfection for evolutionary manifestation here. That is why the

190Earth declares itself a deeper Power than Heaven because it holds

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in itself that possibility implied in the presence of the suppressed

Divine here, — which does not exist in the perfection of the vital

(or even the mental) Heavens.

195JIVANMUKTA

Written in Alcaics. These Alcaics are not perhaps very orthodox.

I have treated the close of the first two lines not as a dactyl but

as a cretic and have taken the liberty in any stanza of turning

this into a double trochee. In one closing line I have started the

200dactylic run with two short preliminary syllables and there is

occasionally a dactyl or anapaest in unlawful places; the dactyls

too are not all pure dactyls. The object is to bring in by modula-

tions some variety and a more plastic form and easier run than

strict orthodoxy could give. But in essence, I think, the alcaic

205movement remains in spite of these departures.

The basic form of this Alcaic would run,

1, 2 ⌣

| ⌣

| ⌣||

210⌣⌣|

⌣

215| ⌣

| ⌣

⌣⌣|

220⌣⌣|

⌣

but with an opening to other modulations.

The subject is the Vedantic ideal of the living liberated man

225— j¯ıvanmukta — though perhaps I have given a pull towards my

own ideal which the strict Vedantin would consider illegitimate.

IN HORIS AETERNUM

This poem on its technical side aims at finding a halfway house

between free verse and regular metrical poetry. It is an attempt

230to avoid the chaotic amorphousness of free verse and keep to a

regular form based on the fixed number of stresses in each line

and part of a line while yet there shall be a great plasticity and

variety in all the other elements of poetic rhythm, the number

of syllables, the management of the feet, if any, the distribution

235of the stress-beats, the changing modulation of the rhythm. In

Pondicherry, c. 1927–1947

Horis Aeternum was meant as a first essay in this kind, a very

simple and elementary model. The line here is cast into three

parts, the first containing two stresses, the second and third

240each admitting three, four such lines rhymed constituting the

stanza.