Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

SABCL - Volume 5

II. Sonnets
1930–1950

The Cosmic Dance

Dance of Krishna, Dance of Kali

Two measures are there of the cosmic dance.

Always we hear the tread of Kali’s feet

Measuring in rhythms of pain and grief and chance

Life’s game of hazard terrible and sweet:

The ordeal of the veiled Initiate,

The hero soul at play with Death’s embrace,

Wrestler in the dread gymnasium of Fate

And sacrifice a lonely path to Grace.

Man’s sorrows made a key to the Mysteries,

Truth’s narrow road out of Time’s wastes of dream,

The soul’s seven doors from Matter’s tomb to rise,

Are the common motives of her tragic theme.

But when shall Krishna’s dance through Nature move,

His mask of sweetness, laughter, rapture, love?

Later edition of this work: The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo.- Set in 37 volumes.- Volume 2.- Collected Poems.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2009.- 751 p.