deathless loveliness

One day in spring, a woman came
In my lonely woods,
In the lovely form of the Beloved.
Came, to give to my songs, melodies,
To give to my dreams, sweetness.
Suddenly a wild wave
Broke over my heart's shores
And drowned all language.
To my lips no name came,
She stood beneath the tree, turned,
Glanced at my face, made sad with pain,
And with quick steps, came and sat by me.
Taking my hands in hers she said:
'You do not know me, nor I you--
I wonder how this could be?'
I said:
'We two shall build, a bridge for ever
Between two beings, each to the other unknown,
This eager wonder is at the heart of things.'

I have loved her.
One stream of that love
Has circled her in a cool embrace
Like the known, shallow village river.
That slow-moving stream
Flows beside low banks of the beloved's
Trivial and daily life.
Drought has often made it feeble,
Bounty of July rain has often made it full and loud.
Dim with the veil of insignificance,
The homely face of the woman--
Sometimes I have loved,
Sometimes mocked and hurt.

The other stream of that love carries
The great Ocean's call.
Noble and generous woman emerges,
After a cleansing wash in those great waters,
From its depth.
In the form of boundless Dhyana
She has entered my mind and body,
Perfecting both my song and me.
She has kept alive eternal Separation's flame
In the hidden depths of my mind.
In its light I have seen her ageless grace--
Seen her in spring flood and flowers and leaves.
In sparks of sunlight
Scattered by shaken sishu leaves,
I have heard the melody
Swiftly struck from the sitar's string;
On the changing season's stage,
In light and shadow,
I have seen her dance of many-coloured veils.

I have seen her seated near Creation's throne,
Seated to the left of God;
Have seen--when Beauty was insulted
By the unclean touch of the ugly, the pitiless--
The destroying fires shooting from Rudrani's eye,
That scorched the secret nest of pestilence.
Day after day,
There has gathered within my songs
Creation's first mystery--Light's unfolding,
And Creation's last mystery--deathless loveliness of Love.

[Rabindranath Tagore, from '14' in Later Poems of Rabindranath Tagore]