On the Bank of the Ravi

Raft in its music, in evening’s hush, the Ravi; But how it is with this heart, do not ask

Hearing in these soft cadences a prayer-call, Seeing all earth God’s precinct, here beside

The margins of the onward-flowing waters Sanding I scarcely know where I am standing

With palsied hand the taverner of heaven Has brought the cup: red wine stains evening’s skirt

Day’s heading caravan has made haste towards Extinction: twilight smoulders like hot ash Of the sun’s funeral pyre

In solitude Far off, magnificent, those towers stand, where The flower of Mughal chivalry lies asleep;

A legend of Time’s tyranny is that palace; A book, the register of days gone by;

No mansion, but a melody of silence— No trees, but an unspeaking parliament.

Swiftly across the river’s bosom glides A boat, the oarsman wrestling with the waves,

A skiff light-motioned as a darting glance, Soon far beyond the eye’s carved boundary.

So glides the bark of mortal life, in the ocean Of eternity so born, so vanishing,

Yet never knowing what is death; for it May disappear from sight, but cannot perish.