Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Poetry and Art

SABCL - Volume 27

Part 2. On His Own and Others’ Poetry
Section 1. On His Poetry and Poetic Method
On Savitri

Comments on Specific Lines and Passages of the Poem [19]

One dealt with her who meets the burdened great. [p. 17]

Who is “One” here? Is it Love, the godhead mentioned before? If not, does this “dubious godhead with his torch of pain” correspond to “the image white and high of godlike Pain” spoken of a little earlier? Or is it Time whose “snare” occurs in the last line of the preceding passage?

Love? It is not Love who meets the burdened great and governs the fates of men! Nor is it Pain. Time also does not do these things — it only provides the field and movement of events. If I had wanted to give a name, I would have done it, but it has purposely to be left nameless because it is indefinable. He may use Love or Pain or Time or any of these powers, but is not any of them. You can call him the Master of the Evolution, if you like.

5 November 1936