THE BARREN WOMAN

At the burning-ghat, O Kali, Mother divine and dread, See, I am waiting with open lips Over the newly dead. I am childless and barren; pity And let me catch the soul Of him who here on the kindled bier Pays to Existence toll. See, by his guileless body I cook the bread and eat. Give me the soul he does not need Now, for conception sweet. Hear, or my lord and husband Shall send me from his door And take to his side a fairer bride Whose breast shall be less poor. Oft I have sought thy temples, By Ganges now I seek, Where ashes of all the dead are strewn, And is my prayer not meek? The ghats and the shrines and the people That bathe in the holy Stream Have heard my cry, O goddess high, Shall I not have my dream? The women of Oudh and Jaipur Look on my face with scorn. Children about their garments cling, To me shall none be born? The death-fires quiver faster, O hasten, goddess, a sign, That from this doom into my womb Thy pledge has passed, divine. Woe! there is naught but ashes, Now, and the weepers go. Lone on the ghat they leave me, lone, With but the River's flow. Kali, I ask not jewels Nor justice, beauty nor shrift, But for the lowest woman's right, A child—tho I die of the gift!

Under the Indian stars, Mumtaz Mahal, I am sitting, Watching them wind their silent way Over your wistful Tomb; Watching the crescent prow Of the moon among them flitting, Fair as the shallop that bore your soul To Paradise's Room. Under the Indian stars, With palm and peepul about me, With dome and kiosk and minaret Mounting against the sky, I seem to see your face In all the fairness without me; In all the sadness that fills my heart To hear your lover's cry. Under the Indian stars I look for your Jasmine Tower, Along the River whose barren bed Lies gray beneath the moon. And thro its magic doors You seem like a spirit flower, Wandering back from Allah's bourne To seek for some lost boon. Under the Indian stars I see you softly moving, Among your jewel-lit maidens there, A sweet and ghostly queen, And the scent of attar flung In your marble font seems proving That passion never can die from love, If truly love has been. Under the Indian stars He comes, "the Shadow of Allah," Jehan, the lord of Magnificence, The liege who holds your heart. The silver doors swing back And alone with him you hallow The amorous night—whose moon has made Such visions in me start. Under the Indian stars— But the end of all is moaning! I hear his dying breath that from Your Tomb shall never die. For every jasper flower He set in its dream seems loaning To Beauty a grief, Mumtaz Mahal, And unto Fate a sigh.