Before the Sun, the Moon, the Earth …..

An exchange of poems between Mary Hale and Swamiji – excerpts –

Mary Hale was a daughter in the Hale family of Chicago – close friends of Swamiji from his earliest time at the Parliament of Religions at Chicago’s world Fair in 1893. Swamiji had written clearly to her earlier, a letter correcting her that he decides in what circles he moves.

Swamiji starts – 15 Feb 1895.

Let eyes grow dim and heart grow faint

And friendship fail and love betray,

Let fate its hundred horrors send

And clotted darkness block the way.

All nature wear one angry frown

To crush you out – still know, my soul,

You are Divine. March on and on,

Nor right nor left but to the goal.

Nor angel I, nor man, nor brute,

Nor body, mind, nor he nor she,

The books do stop in wonder mute

To tell my nature: I am He.

Before the sun, the moon, the earth,

Before the stars or comets free,

Before e’en time has had its birth,

I was, I am and I will be.

The beauteous earth, the glorious sun,

The calm sweet moon, the spangled sky,

Causations laws do make them run;

They live in bonds, in bonds they die.

And mind, its mantle dreamy net

Cast o’er them all and holds them fast.

In warp and woof of thought are set

Earth, hells and heavens, or worst or best.

Know these are but the outer crust –

All space and time, all effect, cause.

I am beyond all sense, all thoughts.

The witness of the universe.

Not two nor many, ’tis but one,

And thus in me all me’s I have.

I cannot hate, I cannot shun

Myself from me, I can but love!

Mary Hale replies –

The monk he would a poet be

And wooed the muse right earnestly;

In thought and word he could well beat her

What bothered him though was the metre.

His feet were all too short, too long,

The form not suited to his song.

He tried the sonnet, lyric, epic,

And worked so hard, he waxed dyspeptic.

While the poetic mania lasted

He e’en from vegetables fasted,

Which Leon had with tender care

Prepared for Swami’s dainty fare.

One day he sat and mused alone –

Sudden, a light around him shone,

The ‘still small voice’ his thoughts inspire

And his words glow like coals fo fire.

And coals of fire they proved to be

Heaped on the head of contrite me –

My scolding letter I deplore

And beg foregiveness o’er and o’er.

The lines you sent to your sisters four

Be sure they’ll cherish evermore,

For you have made them clearly see

The one main Truth that, ‘all is He!’

Swamiji replies –

In days of yore

On Ganga’s shore preaching,

A hoary priest was teaching

How Gods they come

As Sita Ram

And gentle Sita pining, weeping.

The sermon’s end,

They homeward wend

Their way –

The hearers musing, thinking.

When from the crowd

A voice aloud

This question asked beseeching, seeking –

‘Sir, tell me pray,

Who were but they

These Sita Ram you were teaching, speaking?’

So Mary Hale

Allow me tell,

Ou? Mar my doctrines wronging, baulking.  

I never taught

Such queer thought

That all was God – unmeaning talking!

Mary Hale replies –

The difference I clearly see

Twixt Tweedledum and Tweedledee –

That is a proposition sane.

But truly ’tis beyond my vein

To make your Eastern logic plain.

If: ‘God is Truth, all else is naught’,

‘This world a dream, delusion up wrought’,

What can exist which God is not?

All those who ‘many’ see have much to fear.

He only lives to whom the ‘One’ is clear.

So again I say

In my poor way,

I cannot see but that all’s He,

If I’m in Him and He in me.

Swamiji replies –

Tho’ many a lay her muse can bray

And play piano too.

Her heart so cool, chills as a rule

The fool who comes to woo.

Though, Sister Mary, I hear they say

The sway your beauty gains.

Be cautious now and do not bow,

However sweet, to chains.

For ’twill be soon another tune

The moon-struck mate will hear,

If his will but clash, your words will hash

And smash his life I fear.

These lines to thee, Sister Mary,

Free will I offer, take

Tit for tat – a monkey chat,

For monk alone can make.