friday.

HERO

My faith in Thee grows graver
With the dawning of each day:
And my feet grow firmer, braver,
As I travel on the way.
My Love! I never waver
Nor dally nor delay.

Unmindful of the gravel,
Fire-drenched with noonday heat
With hungers to unravel
The secret of my feet:
Towards Thee straight I travel
And find it very sweet!

Beloved, I am bringing
Myself to Thee more near,
My soul is hourly ringing
More certain and more clear.
A well of God is springing
Out of each drop of tear.

Since sometimes in my treading
The path I find the eyes
A sudden teardrop shedding
To take by sweet surprise
A waiting star whose wedding
Shall be in paradise.

My faith in Thee grows truer
And taller than a tower;
My soul grows ever newer,
Re-born in deeper power:
My steps grow fewer, fewer
Towards Thee every hour.

Behold me swiftly gliding
A-challenging the stark
Bare waters, smoothly tiding
O’er billows rough and dark,
Unto Thy care confiding
My tempest-haunted barque.

Though shadows grey and umber
In light’s apparent loss,
Like deep and deathly slumber
Brood heavily across
The waters, I outnumber
Their inky leap and toss

With my uncounted splendors
Flung o’er them far and wide,
Until each billow tenders
A truce on every side,
And silently surrenders
To silence like a bride.

No shadow ever hurteth
The light that is the whole
Horizon-calm which skirteth
The ocean of the soul:
Never Thy love deserteth
The boat that seeks Thy goal.

O let the darks grow thicker
Around the outer seas,
And let the gales blow quicker
And wilder if they please:
My soul without a flicker
Burns through the centuries.

Destruction is mistaken
If with its bleeding-black
Deluge it thinks to waken
Dread on my voyager’s track:
Behold! I am unshaken
By its most dread attack.

My faith in thee shall shield me
Against the darkling horde;
Beloved, thou shalt wield me
Like an all-conquering sword,
And every moment yield me
A splendor unexplored.

--HARINDRANATH CHATTOPADHYAYA, The Divine Vagabond