No More Learning

With her ample back towards every beholder,
With the fascinations of youth, and the equal fascinations of age,
Sits she whom I too love like the rest--sits undisturbed,
Holding up in her hand what has the character of a mirror, while her eyes
glance back from it,
Glance as she sits, inviting none, denying none,
Holding a mirror day and night tirelessly before her own face.

Seen at hand, or seen at a distance,
Duly the twenty-four appear in public every day,
Duly approach and pass with their companions, or a companion,
Looking from no countenances of their own, but from the countenances of
those who are with them,
From the countenances of children or women, or the manly countenance,
From the open countenances of animals, or from inanimate things,
From the landscape or waters, or from the exquisite apparition of the sky,
From our countenances, mine and yours, faithfully returning them,
Every day in public appearing without fail, but never twice with the same
companions.

Embracing man, embracing all, proceed the three hundred and
sixty-five resistlessly round the sun;
Embracing all, soothing, supporting, follow close three hundred and sixty-
five offsets of the first, sure and necessary as they.

Tumbling on steadily, nothing dreading,
Sunshine, storm, cold, heat, for ever withstanding, passing, carrying,

The Soul's realisation and determination still inheriting;
The fluid vacuum around and ahead still entering and dividing,
No baulk retarding, no anchor anchoring, on no rock striking,
Swift, glad, content, unbereaved, nothing losing,
Of all able and ready at any time to give strict account,
The divine ship sails the divine sea.


4.

Whoever you are! motion and reflection are especially for you;
The divine ship sails the divine sea for you.

Whoever you are! you are he or she for whom the earth is solid and liquid,
You are he or she for whom the sun and moon hang in the sky;
For none more than you are the present and the past,
For none more than you is immortality.

Each man to himself, and each woman to herself, such as the word of the
past and present, and the word of immortality;
No one can acquire for another--not one!
Not one can grow for another--not one!

The song is to the singer, and comes back most to him;
The teaching is to the teacher, and comes back most to him;
The murder is to the murderer, and comes back most to him;

The theft is to the thief, and comes back most to him;
The love is to the lover, and conies back most to him;
The gift is to the giver, and comes back most to him--it cannot fail;
The oration is to the orator, the acting is to the actor and actress, not
to the audience;
And no man understands any greatness or goodness but his own, or the
indication of his own.


5.

I swear the earth shall surely be complete to him or her who shall be
complete!
I swear the earth remains jagged and broken only to him or her who remains
broken and jagged!
I swear there is no greatness or power that does not emulate those of the
earth!
I swear there can be no theory of any account, unless it corroborate the
theory of the earth!
No politics, art, religion, behaviour, or what not, is of account, unless
it compare with the amplitude of the earth,
Unless it face the exactness, vitality, impartiality, rectitude, of the
earth.

I swear I begin to see love with sweeter spasms than that which responds
love!
It is that which contains itself--which never invites, and never refuses.

I swear I begin to see little or nothing in audible words!
I swear I think all merges toward the presentation of the unspoken meanings
of the earth;
Toward him who sings the songs of the Body, and of the truths of the earth;
Toward him who makes the dictionaries of words that print cannot touch.

I swear I see what is better than to tell the best;
It is always to leave the best untold.

When I undertake to tell the best, I find I cannot,
My tongue is ineffectual on its pivots,
My breath will not be obedient to its organs,
I become a dumb man.

The best of the earth cannot be told anyhow--all or any is best;
It is not what you anticipated--it is cheaper, easier, nearer;
Things are not dismissed from the places they held before;
The earth is just as positive and direct as it was before;
Facts, religions, improvements, politics, trades, are as real as before;
But the Soul is also real,--it too is positive and direct;
No reasoning, no proof has established it,
Undeniable growth has established it.


6.

This is a poem for the sayers of words--these are hints of meanings,
These are they that echo the tones of souls, and the phrases of souls;
If they did not echo the phrases of souls, what were they then?
If they had not reference to you in especial, what were they then?
I swear I will never henceforth have to do with the faith that tells the
best!
I will have to do only with that faith that leaves the best untold.


7.