Sri Aurobindo

Collected Poems

CWSA.- Volume 2

Part Two. Baroda
Sonnets from Manuscripts, c. 1900 – 1901

I cannot equal

I cannot equal those most absolute eyes,

Although they rule my being, with the stars,

Nor floral rich comparisons devise

To detail sweetness that your body wears.

Nor in the heavens hints of you I find,

Nor dim suggestions in this thoughtful eve;

The moonlight of your darker grace is blind.

Who can with such pale delicacies deceive

A naked burning heart? Only one place

Satisfies me of you, where the feet

That I shall never clasp, with beauty press

The barren earth in one place only sweet,

One face in the wide world alone divine,

The only one that never can be mine.

Earlier edition of this work: Sri Aurobindo Birth Century Library: Set in 30 volumes.- Volume 27.- Supplement.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Asram, 1972.- 511 p.