FLAME ON THE PEAK
Upon the mountain peak
Beyond the misty hills
Above the dusty dales
Burns a luminous flame.
It burns and burns
Day and night
Year in and year out
Undiminished by the weather.
The light of it is delight
The sight of it is insight
It illumines the vision
It enlightens the reason.
The flame burns and burns,
The rains intensified its lustre
The snows increased its warmth
The winds accelerated its movement.
Amid the azure calm
The golden orange flame
Flickers and flickers
With rhythm and radiance.
The rim of the woods
The stream of the floods
The lilies of the valley
Gleam with the glow of the flame.
The flame reflects
In the unuttered words of the poet
In the unseen colours of the painter
In the unheard sounds of the musician.
In the gloomy nights
In the stormy plights
In the phlegmy blights
The flame shows the path.
The flame’s rays penetrate
Where the eye fails to see
Where the ear can’t hear
Where the mind can’t think.
The flame on the peak
Blazes, vagrantly blazes
At the fragrant breezes
Consuming the cold that freezes.
The unknown corners
The unfelt depths
The unattained heights
Are lit up by the flame on the peak.
A tiny flame in a little heart
Far away from the flame on the peak
Flickers and flickers in self-abnegation
To merge with the flame on the peak.
–SANJIVA DEV