Fruit-Gathering | Page 4

in my heart.
Wake, Love, wake! brim my empty cup, and with a breath of song ruffle the night.

XXV
The bird of the morning sings.
Whence has he word of the morning before the morning breaks, and when the dragon night still holds the sky in its cold black coils?
Tell me, bird of the morning, how, through the twofold night of the sky and the leaves, he found his way into your dream, the messenger out of the east?
The world did not believe you when you cried, "The sun is on his way, the night is no more."
O sleeper, awake!
Bare your forehead, waiting for the first blessing of light, and sing with the bird of the morning in glad faith.

XXVI
The beggar in me lifted his lean hands to the starless sky and cried into night's ear with his hungry voice.
His prayers were to the blind Darkness who lay like a fallen god in a desolate heaven of lost hopes.
The cry of desire eddied round a chasm of despair, a wailing bird circling its empty nest.
But when morning dropped anchor at the rim of the East, the beggar in me leapt and cried:
"Blessed am I that the deaf night denied me--that its coffer was empty."
He cried, "O Life, O Light, you are precious! and precious is the joy that at last has known you!"

XXVII
Sanatan was telling his beads by the Ganges when a Brahmin in rags came to him and said, "Help me, I am poor!"
"My alms-bowl is all that is my own," said Sanatan, "I have given away everything I had."
"But my lord Shiva came to me in my dreams," said the Brahmin, "and counselled me to come to you."
Sanatan suddenly remembered he had picked up a stone without price among the pebbles on the river-bank, and thinking that some one might need it hid it in the sands.
He pointed out the spot to the Brahmin, who wondering dug up the stone.
The Brahmin sat on the earth and mused alone till the sun went down behind the trees, and cowherds went home with their cattle.
Then he rose and came slowly to Sanatan and said, "Master, give me the least fraction of the wealth that disdains all the wealth of the world."
And he threw the precious stone into the water.

XXVIII
Time after time I came to your gate with raised hands, asking for more and yet more.
You gave and gave, now in slow measure, now in sudden excess.
I took some, and some things I let drop; some lay heavy on my hands; some I made into playthings and broke them when tired; till the wrecks and the hoard of your gifts grew immense, hiding you, and the ceaseless expectation wore my heart out.
Take, oh take--has now become my cry.
Shatter all from this beggar's bowl: put out this lamp of the importunate watcher: hold my hands, raise me from the still-gathering heap of your gifts into the bare infinity of your uncrowded presence.

XXIX
You have set me among those who are defeated.
I know it is not for me to win, nor to leave the game.
I shall plunge into the pool although but to sink to the bottom.
I shall play the game of my undoing.
I shall stake all I have and when I lose my last penny I shall stake myself, and then I think I shall have won through my utter defeat.

XXX
A smile of mirth spread over the sky when you dressed my heart in rags and sent her forth into the road to beg.
She went from door to door, and many a time when her bowl was nearly full she was robbed.
At the end of the weary day she came to your palace gate holding up her pitiful bowl, and you came and took her hand and seated her beside you on your throne.

XXXI
"Who among you will take up the duty of feeding the hungry?" Lord Buddha asked his followers when famine raged at Shravasti.
Ratnakar, the banker, hung his head and said, "Much more is needed than all my wealth to feed the hungry."
Jaysen, the chief of the King's army, said, "I would gladly give my life's blood, but there is not enough food in my house."
Dharmapaal, who owned broad acres of land, said with a sigh, "The drought demon has sucked my fields dry. I know not how to pay King's dues."
Then rose Supriya, the mendicant's daughter.
She bowed to all and meekly said, "I will feed the hungry."
"How!" they cried in surprise. "How can you hope to fulfil that vow?"
"I am the poorest of you all," said Supriya, "that is my strength. I have my coffer and my store at each of your houses."

XXXII
My king was unknown to me, therefore when he claimed his tribute I was bold to think I would hide myself leaving my debts unpaid.
I fled and fled behind my day's work