Collected Poems - Sri Aurobindo Ashram

50 England and Baroda, 1883 – 1898
Sometimes a thrill of voices broke
In runic tongues of old,
Sometimes pale fingers seemed to stroke
His curls of crisping gold:
Thin laughter sobbed he knew not where
Till God’s own candles paled,
Or else out in the moonless air
A goblin infant wailed.
Now in the moon’s enchanted wake
Wild shadows ran a giant race,
And now the golden glassing lake
Was blotted with a face.
But when the naked moon rose clear
Above the ruins of the day,
Childe Thaliard saw a glinting spear
Across the milky way.
And when the white moon’s sliding feet
One rank of stars had passed,
Upon him smote the windy beat
And terror of a blast.
The tempest rippled thro’ the leaves,
New wine of evening sucked,
And at the water-lily sheaves
With nervous fingers plucked.
And in its wind-white arms it bore
A diademed and sceptred thing,
The semblance of a man, that wore
The glory of a king.
An argent cincture studded thick
With opal and the blushing stone
Fine wrought of texture Arabic
About his middle shone:
And in its buckled girth did sit,
A fierce and cloudy star,
Of temper fine as poet’s wit
The Orient scimitar.