From beyond the far northern horizon
A dim, palpitating fountain of flame
Spread flickeringly
Through the dark, stray clouds that covered the Milky Way,
Across the sky above,
Soft‐glowing, liquid, fleecy lights
Rose, quivered, and shot rays toward the south.
Aurora Borealis lit the sky.
It played, reflected in deep, limpid lakes,
Sent scintillating, transparent flickers that obscured the stars;
Then, as I turned within, floated dream‐waves of light
In my mental sea.
Flickering thoughts, like stars, still uttered
Through my dim mental clouds;
My wisdom’s flashing light then rose from medulla’s horizon
And spread out with lambent light
To brighten, and then dispel,
Dark vapors of my mind.
O Lord! Thou lone, matchless Source of all imitated beauty:
Spread Thy aurora of light and joy
O’er night‐dark hearts everywhere!
Thou greater than the bursting light in my own forehead!
As the Aurora Borealis shoots rays to left and extreme right,
Throwing sudden, iridescent reds, greens, and blues
In sky‐brightening searchlights,
To kiss the sky with lovers’ new‐born fervor,
And sends out ethereal, mystic flames
To leap joyously, then vanish in the all‐swallowing night,
So do I see Thee within me, radiant with joy.
Fountains of strange, bright colors
Flashed out over my mental sky:
They illumined the opaque darkness,
And revealed Thy Light of all lights residing there.
A vision of ever‐changing, rolling, molten light
Coaxed the stars, the trees, the water, all earth, all matter
To melt their grossness,
And merge into the Cosmic Light.
The Aurora inspires me with hope that
I shall liquefy in my samadhi’s fire
All grossness of my mortal being, all Creation’s dust.
Matter shall dissolve, and turn to light;
The darkness will burst in atoms of leaping fire;
My little soul will breathe with eternal breath—
And with my each inhalation in Thee
New star clouds will be born,
And when I exhale my cosmic breath
Whole galaxies will cease to spin, and even to be.
The feeling in my body will expand to become Thy bliss.
No longer must I sustain this little clod of flesh,
My cosmic bosom lightly bears the burden, now,
Of twinkling vapors, gaseous nebulae,
Mighty shining stars, revolving planets, and all living things:
For I am Life Itself!
My body is the universe,
And I am also conscious at its smallest point:
Smaller am I than all little things!
I hide behind the tiny, dancing electron:
I am also larger than huge Betelgeuse.
Small lives drown their littleness in that vast ocean,
To become one with the bigness of all big things.
I am most subtle—the subtlest force has density to cloak me—
Yet all things speak of me.
I wake with the dawn,
I exercise my vital muscle‐rays in the sun;
I sleep in the night
Oft peeping through the twinkling stars.
I smile through the moon,
I heave in the ocean,
I paint, then wipe away all colors on my canvas‐sky.
I form the dewdrop and transform the flowers with my invisible wand;
I sing through the canaries and the nightingales;
It is I who sigh in human breasts;
Who whisper through men’s conscience
And guide them through their pains and joys.
I roar in the thunder;
I work in the noise and dust of factories,
And I play at hide and seek in everything.
The sky, stars, clouds, and waters—
All wond’rously suggest
Thy mystic light, O mystic Charmer:
Thy Aurora Borealis points a path
To New Existence!

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Thou and I are One