Dream: Hound of Heaven

[Guest guest]

Dear Pranaka,

 

I wanted to comment on your dreams. Knowing Amma is a truly overwhelming

experience, isn't it? There's a famous poem by Francis Thompson called

"The Hound of Heaven," in which God, rather than being pursued by man, is

seen as the relentless pursuer, i.e. "The Hound of Heaven." Yogananda liked

this poem and there is even a recording of his reading it aloud. I often think

of Amma this way, too, so relentless is Her pursuit, it seems.

 

I have cut and pasted the (long) poem below.

 

Of course your dream may not be about this at all, but it was my first "hit" on

it.

 

The Hound of Heaven

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;I fled Him, down the arches of the

years;I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind; and in the mist

of tearsI hid from Him, and under running laughter. Up vistaed hopes

I sped; And shot, precipitated,Adown Titanic glooms of chasmèd

fears,From those strong Feet that followed, followed after. But with

unhurrying chase, And unperturbéd pace, Deliberate speed,

majestic instancy, They beat—and a Voice beat More instant

than the Feet— “All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.” I pleaded,

outlaw-wise,By many a hearted casement, curtained red, Trellised with

intertwining charities;(For, though I knew His love Who followèd, Yet

was I sore adreadLest, having Him, I must have naught beside.)But, if one little

casement parted wide, The gust of His approach would clash it to: Fear

wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.Across the margent

of the world I fled, And troubled the gold gateways of the stars, Smiting

for shelter on their clangèd bars: Fretted to dulcet jarsAnd silvern

chatter the pale ports o’ the moon.I said to Dawn: Be sudden—to Eve: Be soon;

With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over From this tremendous

Lover—Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see! I tempted all His servitors,

but to findMy own betrayal in their constancy,In faith to Him their fickleness

to me, Their traitorous trueness, and their loyal deceit.To all swift things

for swiftness did I sue; Clung to the whistling mane of every wind.

But whether they swept, smoothly fleet, The long savannahs of the blue;

Or whether, Thunder-driven, They clanged his chariot ’thwart a

heaven,Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn o’ their feet:— Fear

wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue. Still with unhurrying

chase, And unperturbéd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy, Came on the following Feet,

And a Voice above their beat— “Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter

Me.”I sought no more that after which I strayed In face of man or

maid;But still within the little children’s eyes Seems something,

something that replies,They at least are for me, surely for me!I turned me to

them very wistfully;But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair

With dawning answers there,Their angel plucked them from me by the hair.“Come

then, ye other children, Nature’s—shareWith me” (said I) “your delicate

fellowship; Let me greet you lip to lip, Let me twine you

with caresses, Wantoning With our Lady-Mother’s

vagrant tresses, Banqueting With her in her

wind-walled palace, Underneath her azured dais, Quaffing,

as your taintless way is, From a

chaliceLucent-weeping out of the dayspring.” So it was done:I in

their delicate fellowship was one—Drew the bolt of Nature’s secrecies.

I knew all the swift importings On the wilful face of skies;

I knew how the clouds arise Spuméd of the wild sea-snortings;

All that’s born or dies Rose and drooped with; made them shapersOf

mine own moods, or wailful or divine; With them joyed and was

bereaven. I was heavy with the even, When she lit her

glimmering tapers Round the day’s dead sanctities. I

laughed in the morning’s eyes.I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,

Heaven and I wept together,And its sweet tears were salt with mortal

mine;Against the red throb of its sunset-heart I laid my own to beat,

And share commingling heat;But not by that, by that, was eased my human smart.In

vain my tears were wet on Heaven’s

grey cheek.For ah! we know not what each other says, These things

and I; in sound I speak—Their sound is but their stir, they speak by

silences.Nature, poor stepdame, cannot slake my drouth; Let her, if

she would owe me,Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me The

breasts o’ her tenderness:Never did any milk of hers once bless

My thirsting mouth. Nigh and nigh draws the chase,

With unperturbèd pace, Deliberate speed, majestic instancy;

And past those noised Feet A voice comes yet more fleet—

“Lo! naught contents thee, who content’st not Me.”Naked I wait Thy love’s

uplifted stroke!My harness piece by piece Thou hast hewn from me,

And smitten me to my knee; I am defenceless utterly. I

slept, methinks, and woke,And, slowly gazing, find me stripped in sleep.In the

rash lustihead of my young powers, I shook

the pillaring hoursAnd pulled my life upon me; grimed with smears,I stand amid

the dust o’ the mounded years—My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.My

days have crackled and gone up in smoke,Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a

stream. Yea, faileth now even dreamThe dreamer, and the lute the

lutanist.Even the linked fantasies, in whose blossomy twistI swung the earth a

trinket at my wrist,Are yielding; cords of all too weak accountFor earth with

heavy griefs so overplussed. Ah! is Thy love indeedA weed, albeit an

amaranthine weed,Suffering no flowers except its own to mount? Ah!

must— Designer infinite!—Ah! must Thou char the wood ere Thou can’st

limn with it?My freshness spent its wavering shower i’ the dust;And now my heart

is as a broken fount,Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever

>From the dank thoughts that shiverUpon the sighful branches of my mind.

Such is; what is to be?The pulp so bitter,

how shall taste the rind?I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds;Yet ever

and anon a trumpet soundsFrom the hid battlements of Eternity;Those shaken mists

a space unsettle, thenRound the half-glimpséd turrets slowly wash again.

But not ere him who summoneth I first have seen, enwoundWith glooming

robes purpureal, cypress-crowned;His name I know, and what his trumpet

saith.Whether man’s heart or life it be which yields Thee harvest,

must Thy harvest-fields Be dunged with rotten death?

Now of that long pursuit Comes on at hand the bruit;

That Voice is round me like a bursting sea: “And is thy earth so

marred, Shattered in shard on shard? Lo, all things

fly thee, for thou fliest Me! Strange, piteous, futile

thing!Wherefore should any set thee love apart?Seeing none but I makes much of

naught” (He said),“And human love needs human meriting:

How hast thou merited—Of all man’s clotted clay the dingiest clot?

Alack, thou knowest notHow little worthy of any love thou art!Whom wilt thou

find to love ignoble thee, Save Me, save only Me?All which I took

from thee I did but take, Not for thy harms,But just that thou

might’st seek it in My arms. All which thy child’s mistakeFancies as

lost, I have stored for thee at home: Rise, clasp My hand, and come!”

Halts by me that footfall: Is my gloom, after all,Shade of His hand,

outstretched caressingly? “Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest, I am He Whom

thou seekest!Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.”Francis Thompson

(1859-1907)

 

 

In Amma,

Jyotsna

 

 

 

"Pranakca" <pranakca wrote:

Om Namah Shivaya!

 

Hello brothers & sisters,

I had a dream too. There was this monster who apparantly was gobbling everybody

who goes near it.That part of the dream was not very clear but I was clearly

afraid to go and i remember the terror so i kept telling my fellow devotee who

happened to be a male to go first."He said i am not afraid , i will go." As soon

as he got close to the monster. it picked up this guy and made him a badge and

stuck him on his chest and then the monster got up and i told the others let us

run it is coming our way.

I started running but i have become so fat and short ( lately i have been

stuffing myself with food to fill my desire for happiness) and it felt like i

was crawling on all four and i wasn't fast enough and the monster caught up with

me and picked me up and i stared in terror at the monster and it was Amma.

 

 

 

 

Post your free ad now! Canada Personals

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aum Amriteswarayai Namaha!

 

 

Ammachi/

 

Ammachi

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

A more readable version is

http://www.mcs.drexel.edu/~gbrandal/Illum_html/hound.html

 

If I recall correctly isn't this quoted in the novel Rebecca by Daphne

Du Maurier ?

 

Namashivaya,

girish

 

 

On Tue, 5 Oct 2004 14:11:02 -0700 (PDT), E. Lamb <jyotsna2 wrote:

>

> Dear Pranaka,

>

> I wanted to comment on your dreams. Knowing Amma is a truly overwhelming

> experience, isn't it? There's a famous poem by Francis Thompson called

> "The Hound of Heaven," in which God, rather than being pursued by man, is

> seen as the relentless pursuer, i.e. "The Hound of Heaven." Yogananda liked

> this poem and there is even a recording of his reading it aloud. I often

think

> of Amma this way, too, so relentless is Her pursuit, it seems.

>

> I have cut and pasted the (long) poem below.

>

[Guest guest]

Thanks, Girish! I had no idea the poem would "cut and paste" in that unreadable

way!

 

In response to your question, I don't know. I'm a nonfiction reader, hardly

ever

touch fiction.

 

In Amma's love,

Jyotsna

 

Girish <girishsv wrote:

A more readable version is

http://www.mcs.drexel.edu/~gbrandal/Illum_html/hound.html

 

If I recall correctly isn't this quoted in the novel Rebecca by Daphne

Du Maurier ?

 

Namashivaya,

girish

 

 

On Tue, 5 Oct 2004 14:11:02 -0700 (PDT), E. Lamb <jyotsna2 wrote:

>

> Dear Pranaka,

>

> I wanted to comment on your dreams. Knowing Amma is a truly overwhelming

> experience, isn't it? There's a famous poem by Francis Thompson called

> "The Hound of Heaven," in which God, rather than being pursued by man, is

> seen as the relentless pursuer, i.e. "The Hound of Heaven." Yogananda liked

> this poem and there is even a recording of his reading it aloud. I often

think

> of Amma this way, too, so relentless is Her pursuit, it seems.

>

> I have cut and pasted the (long) poem below.

>

 

 

Aum Amriteswarayai Namaha!

 

 

Ammachi/

 

Ammachi