A Sound Came Quivering Like a Loved Footfall

Savitri: Book 3 Canto 4 Section 1 THEN suddenly there rose a sacred stir. Amid the lifeless silence of the Void In a solitude and an immensity A sound came quivering like a loved footfall Heard in the listening spaces of the soul; A touch perturbed his fibres with delight. An Influence had approached the mortal range, A boundless Heart was near his longing heart, A mystic Form enveloped his earthly shape. All at her contact broke from silence’ seal; Spirit and body thrilled identified, Linked in the grasp of an unspoken joy; Mind, members, life were merged in ecstasy. Intoxicated as with nectarous rain His nature’s passioning stretches flowed to her, Flashing with lightnings, mad with luminous wine. All was a limitless sea that heaved to the moon. A divinising stream possessed his veins, His body’s cells awoke to spirit sense, Each nerve became a burning thread of joy: Tissue and flesh partook beatitude. Alight, the dun unplumbed subconscient caves Thrilled with the prescience of her longed-for tread And filled with flickering crests and praying tongues. Even lost in slumber, mute, inanimate His very body answered to her power. The One he worshipped was within him now: Flame-pure, ethereal-tressed, a mighty Face Appeared and lips moved by immortal words; Lids, Wisdom’s leaves, drooped over rapture’s orbs. A marble monument of ponderings, shone A forehead, sight’s crypt, and large like ocean’s gaze Towards Heaven, two tranquil eyes of boundless thought Looked into man’s and saw the god to come.