Limit

Through the void
of sky and wind,
of water, flame, and earth profound,
through labyrinths of mist where ancient riddles sound,
we climb the mountains—
becoming drifting fragments
of indolent white cloud;
bearing upon our breast
the cataracts of primordial stone,
we rise from height to greater height,
from silence unto silence crowned.

Across our shoulders swings
the satchel of our gathered lore;
along the flinty paths of reason
we advance—uncertain, slow—
one faltering step beyond the edge,
and thought itself falls sheer below.

Our knowledge—
the sleepless wings of a river-gull
bathed in wisdom’s sacred tide.

Our logic—
a raft of pride
adrift upon the floods of self;
if one attains the farther shore,
deliverance waits—
if not, oblivion beside.

And to believe
that shattered doubt alone
establishes the throne of Truth—
ah, what a frail conceit of mind,
what softly smiling arrogance of youth.

Time is eternal—
yet perhaps eternity too
possesses dusk and dawn.

If Time itself
must one day fade,
its first cry heard, its last breath gone,
why then should lust and longing dream
their hunger endless, vast, unborn?

We know not limit.

Nor do we know
where wrath shall cease its crimson blaze.

How high must man ascend
before the heavens truly open?
How deep the lamp of wisdom burn
before its hidden radiance awakens?

Yet still we refuse to ask.

Yashoda once beheld
within child Krishna’s opened mouth
the circling universe entire.

And I too glimpse
the threefold worlds revealed
whenever the little girl parts her lips—

to soothe her hunger,
to answer some small trembling desire—

there itself
the boundaries of my cosmos end.

The famished cry
of another’s child
falls powerless beyond that rim.

The little pool
within a cow’s hoofprint—
that alone becomes our sky;
and for us,
that narrow sky itself
defines infinity.

Has desire ever known an end?

We robe our cravings
in the garments of reason,
beyond all truth and falsehood dressed;
yet finally—
within six feet of patient earth
ambition folds itself to rest.

Unless the limits of the self
remain themselves restrained and small,
even the endless, in the end,
must fade, diminish, and finally fall.

Because one day
Sita crossed the sacred line,
Lanka rose before her gaze.

And therefore—

golden Lanka burned to ash,
while Rama’s heart, in grief undone,
lay desolate beneath the blaze.