Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

CWSA.- Volume 2

Part One. England and Baroda 1883 – 1898
Songs to Myrtilla

O Coïl, Coïl

O coïl, honied envoy of the spring,

Cease thy too happy voice, grief’s record, cease:

For I recall that day of vernal trees,

The soft asoca’s bloom, the laden winds

And green felicity of leaves, the hush,

The sense of Nature living in the woods.

Only the river rippled, only hummed

The languid murmuring bee, far-borne and slow,

Emparadised in odours, only used

The ringdove his divine heart-moving speech;

But sweetest to my pleased and singing heart

Thy voice, O coïl, in the peepel tree.

O me! for pleasure turned to bitterest tears!

O me! for the swift joy, too great to live,

That only bloomed one hour! O wondrous day,

That crowned the bliss of those delicious years.

The vernal radiance of my lover’s lips

Was shut like a red rose upon my mouth,

His voice was richer than the murmuring leaves,

His love around me than the summer air.

Five hours entangled in the coïl’s cry

Lay my beloved twixt my happy breasts.

O voice of tears! O sweetness uttering death!

O lost ere yet that happy cry was still!

O tireless voice of spring! Again I lie

In odorous gloom of trees; unseen and near

The windlark gurgles in the golden leaves,

The woodworm spins in shrillness on the bough:

Thou by the waters wailing to thy love,

O chocrobacque! have comfort, since to thee

The dawn brings sweetest recompense of tears

And she thou lovest hears thy pain. But I

Am desolate in the heart of fruitful months,

Am widowed in the sight of happy things,

Uttering my moan to the unhousèd winds,

O coïl, coïl, to the winds and thee.

Earlier edition of this work: Sri Aurobindo Birth Century Library: Set in 30 volumes.- Volume 5.- Collected Poems.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Asram, 1972.- 625 p.