 India's Love Lyrics by Lawrence Hope, published in 1901, recorded by Helen Williford Lauer in 12 sections of seven poems each for LibriVox. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. India's Love Lyrics, section one, Less than the Dust. Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel. Less than the rust that never stained thy sword. Less than the trust thou hast in me, O Lord. Even less than these. Less than the weed that grows beside thy door. Less than the speed of ours spit far from the less than the need thou hast in life of me. Even less am I. Since I, O Lord, am nothing unto thee, see here thy sword. I make it keen and bright. Love's last reward. Death comes to me tonight. Farewell, Zahir Udin. To the unattainable. Oh, that my blood were water. Thou thirst. And thou and I in some far desert land. How would I shed it gladly, if but first it touched by lips before it reached the sand? Once all the gods were good to me. I threw myself upon a poisoned snake that crept where my beloved. A lesser love we knew than this which now consumes me holy. Slept. But thou, alas, what can I do for thee? By fate and thine own beauty set above the need of all or any aid for me. Too high for service. As too far for love. In the early curly morning, song by Valgovin, the fields are full of poppies and the skies are very blue. By the temple in the corpus I wait, beloved, for you. The level land is sunny and the errant air is gay. It's scent of rose and honey. Will you come to me today? From carven walls above me smile lovers, many a pair. Oh, take this rose and love me. She has twined it in her hair. He advances, she retreating, pursues and holds her fast. The sculptor left them meeting in a close embrace at last. Through centuries together in the carven stone they lie, in the glow of gold and weather and endless azure sky. Oh, that we, who have for pleasure so short and scant to stay, should waste our summer leisure. Will you come to me today? The temple bells are ringing for the marriage month has come. I hear the women singing and the throbbing of the drum. And when the song is failing or the drums a moment mute, the weirdly wistful wailing of the melancholy flute, little life has got to offer and little man to lose. Since today fate deigns to proffer, oh, wherefore then refuse to take this transient hour in the dusky temple gloom, while the poppies are in flower and the mango trees bloom. And if fate remember later and come to claim her due, what sorrow will be greater than the joy I had with you. For today, lit by her laughter, between the crushing years, I will chance in the hereafter eternities of tears. Reverie of Muhammad Akram at the Tamarin tank. The desert is parched in the burning sun and the grass is scorched and white. But the sand is past and the march is done. We are camping here tonight. I sit in the shade of the temple walls, while the cadence water evenly falls and a peacock out of the jungle calls to another on yonder too. Above, half seen in the lofty gloom, strange works of a long dead people loom. Obscene and savage and half a face, an elephant hunt, a musician's feast, and curious matings of man and beast. What did they mean to the men who are long since dust, whose fingers traced in this arid waste, these rioting twisted figures of love and lust? Strange, weird things that no man may say. Things humanity hides away. Secretly done. Catch the light of the living day. Smile in the sun. Cruel things that man may not name naked here without fear or shame left in the carbon stone. Deep in the temple's innermost shrine is set, where the bats and shadows dwell, the worn and ancient symbol of life at rest in its oval shell. By which the men who have old the land possessed represented their great destroying power. I cannot forget that just as my life was touching its fullest power, love came and destroyed it all in a single hour. Therefore the dual mystery suits me well. Sitting alone, the tank's deep water is cool and sweet. Soothing and fresh to the way warm feet. Dreaming, under the tamar and shade, one silently thanks the men who made so green a place in this bitter land of sunburned sand. The peacocks scream and the gray doves coo. Little green talkative parrot's woo and small gray swirls with fear scants at Aina and me in their furtive grants come shyly with quivering fur to see the stranger under their tamarin tree. Daylight dies. The campfires redden like angry eyes. The tents show white in the glimmering light. Spirals of tremulous smoke arise to the purple skies. And the hum of the camp sounds like the sea drifting over the sand to me. A far in the desert some wild voice sings to a jangling zither with minor streams and under the stars growing keen above. I think of the thing that I love. A beautiful thing. Alert, serene, with passionate dreaming, wistful eyes dark and deep as mysterious skies. Seeing from a vessel at sea. Alas, you drifted away from me. And time and space have rushed in between. But they cannot undo the thing that has been. Though it never again may be. You were mine from dusk until dawning light for the perfect hole of that bygone night. You belong to me. They say that love is a light thing, a foolish thing, a slight thing. A ripe fruit rotten at core. They speak in this futile fashion to me, who am wracked with passion, tormented beyond compassion, forever and ever more. They say that possession lessens a lover's delight. As radiant mornings fade into afternoon, I held what I loved in my arms for many a night. Yet ever the morning lightened the sky too soon. Beyond our tents, the sand stretched level and far around this little oasis of tamarind trees. A curious eastern fragrance fills the breeze from the ruinous temple garden where roses are. I dream of the rose like perfume that fills your hair. Of times when my lips were free of your soft closed eyes. While down in the tank, the waters ripple and rise, and the flying foxes silently cleave the air. The present is subtly wedded into the past. My love of you with the purple Indian dusk, with its clinging scent of sandal incense and musk, and withering jasmine flowers. My eyes grow dead and my senses fail at last, while the lonely hours follow each other silently, one by one, till the night is almost done. Then weary and drunk with dreams, with my garments damp and heavy with dew, I wander towards the camp. Tired with a brain in which fancy and fact are blunt, I stumble across the ropes till I reach my tent. And then to rest, to ensuit my sleep with lies, to dream I lie in the light of your long lost eyes. My lips set free to love and linger over your soft loose hair. To dream I lay your delicate beauty bare. To solace my fevered eyes. Ah, if my life might end in a night like this, drift into death from dreams of your granted kiss. Versus, you are my God. And I would feign adore you with sweet and secret rights of other days. Burn scented oil in silver lamps before you. Pour perfume on your feet with prayer and praise. Yet we are one. Your gracious condescension granted and grants the loveliness I crave. One in the perfect sense of Eastern mention. Gold in the bracelet. Water in the way. Song of Kanzata. As one may sip strangers bowl. You gave yourself but not your soul. I wonder now that time has passed where you will come to rest at last. You gave your beauty for an hour. I held it gently as a flower. You wished to leave me. Told me so. I kissed your feet. And let you go. The teak forest. Whether I loved you. Who shall say? Whether I drifted down your way in the endless river of chance and change. And you woke the strange unknown longings that have no names. But burn us all in their hidden flames. Who shall say? Life is a strange and a wayward thing. We heard the bells of the temple's ring. The married children in passing sing. The month of marriage. The month of spring was full of the breath of sunburned flowers that bloom in a fiercer light than ours. And under a sky more fiercely blue. I came to you. You told me tales of your vivid life. Where death was cruel and danger rife. Of deep dark forests. Of poisoned trees. Of pains and passions that scorch and freeze of southern noontides and eastern nights. Where love grew frantic with strange delights. While men were slaying and maidens danced till I who listened lay still entranced. Then, swift as a swallow heading south, I kissed your mouth. One night when the planes were bathed in blood from sunset light in a crimson flood, we wandered under the young teak trees whose branches whined in the light night breeze. You led me down to the water's brink. The spring where the panthers come to drink at night. There is always water here, be the season never so parched and sear. Have we the souls of beasts in the forms of men? I would have tasted your life blood then. The night fell swiftly. This sudden land can never lend us a twilight strand. Twix the daylight shore and the ocean night. But takes as it gives at once the light. We laid us down on the steep hillside while far below us wild peacocks cried and we sometimes heard in the sun burnt grass the stealthy steps of the jungle paths. We listened, knew not whether they went on love or hunger than more intent. And under your kisses I hardly knew whether I loved or hated you. But your words were flame and your kisses fire and who shall resist a strong desire, not I whose life is a broken boat on a sea of passions adrift afloat. And whether I came in love or hate that I came to you was written by fate. In every hue of the blood red sky in every tone of the peacocks cry. While every gust of the jungle night was fanning the flame you had set a light for these things have power to stir the blood and compel us all to their own chance mood. And to love or not we are no more free than a ripple to rise and leave the sea. We are ever and always slaves of these of the suns that scorch and the winds that freeze of the faint sweet scents of the sultry air of the half heard howl from the far off layer. These chance things master us ever compel to the heights of heaven the depths of hell. Whether I love you. You do not ask nor waste yourself on the thankless task. I give your kisses at least return. What matter whether they freeze or burn. I feel the strength of your fervent arms. What matter whether it heals or harms. You are wise. You take what the gods have sent. You ask no questions but rest content. So I am with you to take your kiss. And perhaps I value you more for this. For this is wisdom to love to live to take what fate or the gods may give to ask no question to make no prayer to kiss the lips and caress the hair. Speed passions airb as you greet its flow to have to hold and in time. Let go. And this is our wisdom. We rest together on the great lone hills in the storm filled weather and watch the skies as they pale and burn the golden stars in their orbits turn while love is with us and time and peace and life has nothing to give but these. But whether you love me. Who shall say or whether you drifting down my way in the great sad river of chance and change with your looks so weary and words so strange lit my soul from some hidden flame to a passionate longing without a name. Who shall say not I who am but a broken boat content for a while to drift to float in the little noon tide of love's delights between two nights in a section one India's love lyrics by Lawrence Hope recorded by Helen Willaford Lauer. Section two India's love lyrics by Lawrence Hope recorded by Helen Willaford Lauer. This lever box recording is in the public domain Valgovans boat song waters glisten and sunbeams quiver the wind blows fresh and free take my boat to your breast oh river carry me out to sea this land is laden with fruit and grain with never a place left free for flowers a fruitful mother but I am feigned for brides in their early bridal hours take my boat to your breast oh river carry me out to sea the sea beloved by a thousand ships is made and ever and fresh and free all for the touch of her cool green lips carry me out to sea take my boat to your breast dear river and carry it out to sea Kashmiri song by Juma you never loved me and yet to save me one unforgettable night you gave me such chill embraces as the snow covered heights received from clouds in northern auroral nights such keen communion as the frozen mirror has with immaculate moonlight cold and clear and all desire like failing fire died slowly faded surely and sank to rest against the delicate chillness of zero in captivity love me a little lord or let me go I am so weary walking to and fro through all your lonely halls that were so sweet did they but echo to your coming feet when by the flowered scrolls of lace like stone our women's windows I am left alone across the yellow desert looking forth I see the purple hills towards the north behind those jagged mountains lilac crest once lay the captive birds small rifle nest there was my brother slain my sister bound his blood her tears drunk by the thirsty ground then while the burning village smoked on high and desecrated all the peaceful sky they took us captive us born frank and free on fleet strong camels through the sandy sea yet when we rested night times on the sand by the rare waters of this weary land our captors or the camp was wrapped in sleep talked and I listen and forgot to we is he not brave and fair they asked our king slender as one tall palm tree by a spring erect serene with gravely brilliant eyes as deeply dark as are these desert skies truly no bitter fate they said and smiled awaits the beauty of this captured child then something in my heart began to sing and secretly I long to see the king sometimes the other maiden sat in tears sometimes consoled they gestured at their fears musing what lovers time to them would bring but I was silent thinking of the king till when the weary endless sands were passed when far to south the city rose at last all speech foresook me and my eyelids fell since I already loved my Lord so well then the division some were sent away to merchants in the city some they say to summer palaces beyond the walls but me they took straight to the sultan's halls every morning I would wake and say our sisters shall I see our Lord today the women rubbed me perfumed me and smiled when were his feet unfleet to pleasure child and tales they told me of his deeds in war of how his name was reverence to far and crouching closer in the lamp's faint glow they told me of his beauty speaking low what need what need the women wasted art I loved you with every fiber of my heart already my God when did I not love you in life in death when shall I not love you you never seek me all day long I lie watching the changes of the far off sky behind the latticework of carbon stone and all night long alas I lie alone but you come never all my Lord the king how can you find it well to do this thing come once come only sometimes as I lie I doubt if I shall see you first or die ah could I hear your footsteps at the door hallowed the lentil and caress the floor then I might drink your beauty satisfied die of delight ere you could reach my side alas you come not Lord life's flame burns low faint for loveliness it may not know faint for your face oh come come soon to me lest though you should not death should set me free marriage thoughts by morsell and con bridegroom I give you my house and my lands all golden with harvest my sword my shield and my jewels the spoils of my strife my strength and my dreams and ought I have gathered of glory and tonight tonight I shall give you my very life bride I may not raise my eyes oh my Lord toward you and I may not speak what matter my voice would fail but through my downcast lashes feeling your beauty I shiver and burn with pleasure beneath my veil younger sisters we throw sweet perfume upon her head and delicate flowers round her bed ah would it that were our turn to wed mother I see my daughter vaguely through my tears lost caresses of my early years I see the bridegroom King of men in truth ah my first lover and my vanished youth bride almost I dread this night my senses fail me how shall I dare to clasp a thing so dear many have feared your name but I your beauty Lord of my life be gentle to my fear younger sisters in the softest silk is our sister dressed with silver rubies upon her breast where a dearer treasure tonight will rest dancing girls see his hair is like silk and his teeth are whiter than whitest of jasmine flowers pity they marry and thus I would change my jewels against his caresses verily sisters this marriage is greatly a loss for us bride would that the music ceased and the night drew round us with solitude shadow and sound of closing doors so that our lips might meet and our beings mingle while mine drank deep of the essence beloved of yours passing mendicant out of the joy of your marriage feast Oh brothers be good to me the way is long and the shrine is far where my weary feet would be and feasting is always somewhat sad to those outside the door still love is only a dream and life itself is hardly more to the unattainable lament of Muhammad Akram I would have taken golden stars from the sky for your necklace I would have shaken rose leaves for your rest from all the rose trees but you had no need the short sweet grass suffice for your slumber and you took no heed of such trifles as gold or a necklace there is an hour at twilight too heavy with memory there is a flower that I fear for your hair had its fragrance I would have squandered youth for you and its hope and its promise before you wandered careless away from my useless passion but what is the use of my speech since I know of no words to recall you I am praying that time may teach you your cruelty me forgetfulness Muhammad Akram's appeal to the stars oh silver stars that shine on what I love touch the soft hair and sparkle in the eyes sin from your calm serenity above sleep to whom sleepless here despairing lies broken for Lorne a palm of desert sand that sucks these tears and utterly abased looking across the lonely level land with thoughts more desolate than any waste planets that shine on what I so adore now thrown the hour is late in careless rest protect that sleep which I may watch no more I the cast out dismissed and dispossessed far in the hillside camp in slumber lies what my worn eyes worship but never see happier stars your myriad silver eyes feast on the quiet face denied to me loved with a love beyond all words or sense lost with a grief beyond the saltest tear so lovely so removed remote and hence so doubly and so desperately dear stars from your skies so purple and so calm that through the centuries your secrets keep send to this worn out brain some occult balm send me for many nights so sleepless sleep and air the sunshine of the desert jars my sense with sorrow and another day through your soft magic oh my silver stars turn sleep to death in some mysterious way reminiscence of Muhammad Akram I shall never forget you never never escape your memory woven about the beautiful things of life the sudden thought of your face is like a wound when it comes unsought on some scent of jasmine lilies or pale tuberose any one of the sweet white fragrant flowers flowers I used to love and lay in your hair sunset is terribly sad I saw you stand tall against the red and the gold like a slender palm the light wind stirred your hair as you wave your hand wave farewell as ever serene and calm to me the passion weary and tossed and torn writing down the road in the gathering gray since that day the sunset red is empty the gold forlorn often across the banqueting board at night's men linger about your name in careless praise the name that cuts deep into my soul like a knife and the gay guest faces and flowers and leaves and lights fade away from the failing sense and a haze and the music sways far away in unmeasured distance I cannot forget I cannot escape what are the stars to me stars that meant so much too much in my youth stars that sparkled about your eyes made a radiance around your hair what are they now lingering lights of a finished feast little lingering sparks rather of a light that is long gone out end section two india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen williford lauer section three india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen williford lauer this recording is in the public domain story by lala g the priest he loved the plant with a keen delight a passionate fervor strange to see tended it ardently day and night yet never a flower lit up the tree the leaves were succulent thick and green and sessile out of the snake-like stem rose spine-like fingers alert and caned catch at ought that molested them but though they nurtured it day and night with love and labor the child and he were never granted the long foresight of a flower crowning the twisted tree until one evening a way-worn priest stopped for the night in the temple shade and shared the fare of their simple feast under the vines and jasmine laid he later wandering round the flowers paused a while by the blossomless tree the man said may it be fault of ours that never its buds my eyes may see a slip it came from the further east many a sunlit summer ago it grows in our jungles said the priest men see it rarely but this i know the jungle people worship it say they bury a child around its roots bury it living the only way to crimson glory of flowers and fruits he spoke and whispers his furtive glance probing the depths of the garden shade the man came closer with eyes as scants the child beside them shivered afraid a cold wind drifted about the three jarring the spines with the hungry sound the spines that grew on the snake-like tree and guarded its roots beneath the ground after the fall of the summer rain the plant was glorious redly gay blood red with blossom never again men saw the child in the temple play request give me yourself one hour i do not crave for any love or even thought of me come as a sultan may caress a slave and then forget forever utterly come as west winds that passing cool and wet or desert places leave them fields and flower and all my life for i shall not forget will keep the fragrance of that perfect hour story of udapur told by lalaji the priest and when the summer heat is great and every hour intense the mogra with its subtle flowers intoxicates the sands the coco palms stood tall and slim against the golden glow and all their gray and graceful plumes were waving to and fro she lay forgetful in the boat and watched the dying sun sink slowly lakewards while the stars replaced him one by one she saw the marble temple walls long white reflections make the echoes of their silver bells were blown across the lake the evening air was very sweet from off the island flowers came scents of mogra trees and bloom and oleander flowers the mogra flowers that smell so sweet when love's young fancies play the acrid mogra flowers still sweet though love be burnt away the boat went drifting uncontrolled the rower road no more but deathly turned the slender pro towards the further shore the dying sunset touched with gold the jasmine in his hair his eyes were darkly luminous she looked and found him fair and so persuasively he spoke she could not say amne and when his young hands took her own she smiled and let them stay and all the youth awaken him all love of love in her all scents of white and subtle flowers that filled the twilight air combined together with the night in kind conspiracy to do love service while the boat went drifting onward the mogra flowers the mogra flowers while youth's quick pulses play they are so sweet they still are sweet though passion burns away low in the boat the lovers lay and from his sable curls the jasmine flowers slipped away to rest among the girls oh silver lake and silver night and tender silver sky where as the hours passed the moon rose white and cold on high the mogra flowers the mogra flowers so dear in youth at play the small and subtle mogra flowers that only last a day suddenly frighten she awoke and waking vaguely saw the boat had stranded in the sedge that fringed the further shore the breeze grown chilly swayed the palms she heard still half awake a prowling jackals hungry cry blown faintly over the lake she shivered but she turned to kiss his soft remembered face lit by the pallid light he lay in youth's abandoned grace but as her lips met his she paused in terror and dismay the white moon showed her by her side asleep a leper lay ah mogra flowers white mogra flowers all love is blind they say the mogra flowers so sweet so sweet the love be burnt away valgovine song in the spring the temple bells are ringing the young green corn is springing and the marriage month is drawing very near i lie hidden in the grass and i count the moment's pass for the month of marriages is drawing near soon ah soon the women spread the appointed bridal bed with hibiscus buds and crimson marriage flowers where when all the songs are done and the dear dark night begun i shall hold her in my happy arms for hours she is young and very sweet from the silver on her feet to the silver and the flowers in her hair and her beauty makes me swoon as the mogra trees at noon intoxicate the hot and quivering air ah i would the hours were fleet as her silver circled feet i am weary of the daytime and the night i am weary unto death oh my rose with jasmine breath with the longing for your beauty and your light youth i am not sure if i knew the truth what his case or crime might be i only know that he pleaded youth a beautiful golden plea youth with its sunlit passionate eyes its rosy velvet skin a plea to cancel a thousand lies or a thousand nights of sin the men who judged him were old and gray their eyes and their senses dim he brought the light of a warm spring day to the courthouse bear and grim could he plead in a lovelier way his judges acquitted him when love is over song of consada only in august my heart was aflame catching the scent of your wind stirred hair now though you spread it to soften my sleep through the night i should hardly care only last august i drank that water because it had chance to cool your hands when love is over how little of love even the lover understands golden eyes amber eyes oh golden eyes oh eyes so softly gay wherein swift fancies fall and rise grow dark and fade away eyes like a little limpid pool that holds a sunset sky while on its surface calm and cool blue water lilies lie oh tender eyes oh wistful eyes you smiled on me one day and all my life in glad surprise leaped up and pleaded stay alas oh cruel star like eyes so grave and yet so gay you went to lighten other skies smiled once and passed away oh you who my name golden eyes perhaps i used to know your beauty under other skies in lives lived long ago perhaps i rode with galley slaves whose labor never ceased to bring across Phoenician waves your treasures from the east maybe you were an emperor then and i a favorite slave some youth who from the lion's den you vainly tried to save maybe i reigned a mighty king the early nations knew and you were some slight captive thing some maiden whom i slew perhaps a drift on desert shores besides some shipwrecked prowl i gladly gave my life for yours would i might give it now or on some sacrificial stone strange gods we satisfied perhaps you stooped and left a throne to kiss me ere i died perhaps still further back than this in times ere men were men you granted me a moment's bliss in some dark desert den when with your amber eyes a light with iridescent flame and fierce desire for love's delight towards my lair you came ah laughing ever brilliant eyes these things men may not know but something in your radiance lies that centuries ago lit up my life in one wild blaze of infinite desire to revel in your golden rays or in your light expire if this oh strange ringed eyes be true that through all changing lives this longing love i have for you eternally survives may i not sometimes dare to dream in some far time to be your softly golden eyes may glean responsibly on me ah gentle subtle changing eyes you smiled on me one day and all my life in glad surprise leaped up imploring stay alas alas oh golden eyes so cruel and so gay you went to shine in other skies smiled once and passed away section three india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen wilaford lauer section four india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen wilaford lauer this leap of ox recording is in the public domain cotrie by the river at cotrie by the river when the evening sun is low the waving palm trees quiver the golden waters glow the shining ripples shiver descending to the sea at cotrie by the river she used to wait for me so young she was and slender so pale with wistful eyes as luminous and tender as cotrie's twilight skies her face broke into flowers red flowers at the mouth her voice she sang for hours like the bubbles in the south we sat beside the water through burning summer days and many things i taught her of love and all its ways of love man's loveliest duty of passions reckless pain of youth whose transient beauty comes once but not again she lay and laughed and listened beside the water's edge the glancing river glistened and glented through the sedge green parrots flew above her and as the daylight died her young arms drew her lover more closely to her side oh days so warm and golden oh nights so cool and still when love would not be holding and pleasure had his will days when in after leisure content to rest we lay nights when her lips soft pressure drained all my life away and while we sat together beneath the babble trees the fragrant salty weather cooled by the river breeze if passion faulted ever and left the senses free we heard the tireless river descending to the sea i know not where she wandered or went in after days or if her youth she squandered in loves more doubtful ways perhaps beside the river she died still young and fair perchance the grasses quiver above her slumber there at koutri by the river maybe i too shall sleep the sleep that lasts forever too deep for dreams too deep maybe among the shingle and sand of floods to be her dust and mine may mingle and float away to sea oh koutri by the river when evening sun is low your faint reflections quiver your golden ripples glow you knew oh koutri river that love which could not last for me your poems still shiver with passions of the past farewell farewell aziz it was not mine to fold you against my heart for any length of days i had no loveliness alas to hold you no siren voice no charm that lovers praise yet in the midst of grief and desolation solace i'm my despairing soul with this once for my life's eternal consolation you lint my lips your loveliness to kiss ah that one night i think love's very essence distilled itself from out my joy and pain like tropical trees whose fervored inflorescence glows gleams and dies never to bloom again often i marvel how i met the morning with living eyes after that night with you ah how i cursed the one white light for dawning and mourned the paling stars as each withdrew yet i even i who am less than dust before you less than the lowest lintel of your door was given one breathless midnight to adore you fate having granted this can give no more a freedy love since oh beloved you are not even faithful to me who loved you so for one short night for one brief space of darkness though my absence did but endure until the dawning light since all your beauty which was mine you squandered on that which now lies dead across your door see here this knife may keen and bright to kill you you shall not see the sun rise anymore lie still lie still in all the empty village who is there left to hear or heed your cry all are gone down to labor in the valley who will return before your time to die no use to struggle when i found you sleeping i took your hands and bound them to your side and both these slender feet two apt at straying down to the cot on which you lie are tied i still beloved that dead thing lying yonder i hated and i killed but love is sweet and you are more than sweet to me who love you who decked my eyes with dust from off your feet give me your lips ah lovely and disloyal give me yourself again before you go down through the darkness of the great blind portal all of life's best and basest you must know first while beloved you were so young and fragile i held you gently as one holds a flower but now god knows what used to still be tender to one whose life is done within an hour i hurt what then death will not hurt you dearest as you hurt me just for one single night you call me cruel who laid my life in ruins to gain one little moment of delight look up look out across the open doorway the sunlight streams the distant hills are blue look at the pale pink peach trees in our garden sweet fruit will come of them but not for you the fair far snow upon those jagged mountains that gnaw against the hard blue afghan sky will soon descend set free by summer sunshine you will not see those taunts sweeping by the world is not for you from this day forward you must lie still alone who would not lie alone for one night only though returning i was when earliest dawn should break the sky there lies my loot and many strings are broken someone was playing it and someone tore the silken tassels around my hookah woven someone who plays in smokes and loves no more someone who took last night his fill of pleasure as i took mine at dawn the knife went home straight through his heart god only knows my rapture bathing my chill hands in the warm red foam and so i pain you this is only loving wait till i kill you ah the soft curled hair surely the fault was mine to love and leave you even a single night you are so fair cold steel is very cooling to the fervor of over passionate ones beloved like you nay turn your lips to mine not quite unlovely there are is yet though quite untrue what will your brothers say tonight returning with laden camels homewards to the hills finding you dead and me asleep beside you will he awake me first before he kills for i shall sleep here on the cot beside you when you my heart's delight are cold in death when your young heart and restless lips are silent grown chili even beneath my burning breath when i have slowly drawn my knife across you taking my pleasure as i see you swoon i shall sleep sound worn out by love's last fervor and then god grant your kinsmen kill me soon yasmini at night when passions ebbing tide left bare the sands of truth yasmini resting by my side spoke softly of her youth and one she said was tall and slim two crimson rose leaves made his mouth and i was feigned to follow him down to his village and south he was to build a hut hard by the stream where palms were growing we were to live and love and lie and watch the water flowing ah dear delusive distant shore by dreams of futile fancy guilt the riverside we never saw the palm leaf hut was never built one had a taupe of mango trees where early morning noon and late the persian wheels with patient ease brought up their liquid silver freight and he was feigned to rise and reach that garden sloping to the sea whose groves along the wave swept beach should shelter him and love and me doubtless upon that western shore with ripe fruit falling to the ground there dwells the peace he hungered for the lovely peace we never found then there came one with eager eyes and keen sword ready for the fray he missed the storms of northern skies the reckless raid and skirmish gay he rose from dreams of war's alarms to make his daggers keen and bright desiring in my very arms the fiercer rapture of the fight he left me soon too soon and sought the stronger earlier love again news reached me from the kabul court afterwards nothing doubtless slain doubtless his brilliant haggard eyes long since took leave of life and light and those light limbs i used to prize feasted the jackal and the kite but the most loved his 16 years shown in his cheeks transparent red my kisses were his first my tears fell on his face when he was dead he died he died i speak the truth the light love leave his memory dim he was the lover of my youth and all my youth went down with him for passion ebbs and passion flows but under every new caress the ribbon heart more keenly knows its own inviolate faithfulness our gods are kind and still deem fit as in old days with those who lie whose silent hearts are yet unlit by the soft light of infancy therefore one strange mysterious night alone within the temple shade recipient of a god's delight i lay in raptured unafraid also to me the boon was given but morning quickly followed mirth my son whose father stooped from heaven died in the moment of his birth when from the war beyond the seas the reckless lancers home returned their spoils were laid across my knees about my lips their kisses burned back from the comradeship of death free from the friendship of the sword with brilliant eyes and famished breath they came to me for their reward why do i tell you all these things bearing my life to you unsought when passion folds his wearied wings sleep should be follower never thought i let us sleep the window pane grows pale against the purple sky the dawn is with us once again the dawn which always means goodbye within her little trellis room beside the palm french sea she wakeful in the scented gleam spoke of her youth to me oh jira to her lover i am waiting in the desert looking out towards the sunset and counting every moment till we meet i am waiting by the marshes and i tremble and i listen till the salt sands thrill beneath your coming feet till i see you tall and slender standing clear against the skyline a graceful shade across the lingering red while your hair the breezes ruffle turns to silver in the twilight and makes a fair faint aureal around your head far away towards the sunset i can see a narrow river that unwinds itself in red tranquility i can hear its rippled meaning and the gurgle of its greeting as it mingles with the loved and long sought sea in the purple sky above me showing dark against the starlight long wavering flights of homeward birds fly low they cry each one to the other and their weird and wistful calling makes most melancholy music as they go oh my dearest hasten hasten it is lonely here already have i heard the jackals first assembling cry and among the purple shadows of the mangroves and the marshes the veletkas of their footfalls passing by ah come soon my arms are empty and so weary for your beauty i am thirsty for the music of your voice come to make the marshes joyous with the sweetness of your presence let your nearing feet bid all the sands rejoice my hands my lips are feverish with the longing and the waiting and no softness of the twilight soothes their heat till i see your radiant eyes shining stars beneath the starlight till i kiss the slender coolness of your feet our loveliest most reluctant when you lay yourself beside me all the planets reel around me fade away and the sands grow dim uncertain i stretch out my hands toward you while i try to speak but no not what to say i am faint with love and longing and my burning eyes are gazing where the furtive jackals wage their famished strife oh your shadow on the mangroves and your step upon the sandhills this is the loveliest evening of my life Mohammed Akram if someday this body of mine were burned it found no favor alas with you and the ashes scattered abroad unearned would love die also would thought die too but who can answer or who can trust no dreams would harry the wind blown dust where i laid away in the furrows deep secure from jackal and passing plow would your eyes not follow me still through sleep torment me then as they torture now would you ever have loved me golden eyes had i done ought better or otherwise was i over speechful or did you yearn when i sat silent for songs or speech oh beloved i had been so apt to learn so apt had you only cared to teach but time for silence and song is done you wanted nothing my golden son what should you want of a waning star that drifts in its lonely orbit far away from yourself a fulgent light in outer planes of eternal night farewell farewell aziz it was not mine to fold you against my heart for any length of days i had no loveliness alas to hold you no siren voice no charm that lovers praise yet in the midst of grief and desolation solace i my despairing soul with this once for my life's eternal consolation you lint my lips your loveliness to kiss ah that one night i think love's very essence distilled itself from out my joy and pain like tropical trees whose fervored inflorescence glows gleams and dies never to bloom again often i marvel how i met the morning with living eyes after that night with you ah how i cursed the one white light for dawning and mourned the paling stars as each withdrew yet i even i who am less than dust before you less than the lowest lintel of your door was given one breathless midnight to adore you fate having granted this can give no more end section four india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded for libra vox by helen williford lauer section five india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen williford lauer this recording is in the public domain the aloe my life was like an aloe flower beneath an orient sky your sunshine touched it for an hour it blossomed but to die torn up cast out on rubbish heaps where red flames work their will each atom of the aloe keeps the flower time fragrance still memory how i loved you in your sleep with the starlight on your hair the touch of your lips was sweet a zeeze whom i adore i lay at your slender feet and against their soft palms pressed i fitted my face to rest as winds blow over the sea from citron gardens ashore came through your scented hair the breeze of the night to me my lips grew arid and dry my nerves were tense though your beauty sued the eye it maddens the sense every curve of that beauty is known to me every tent of that delicate rose leaf skin and these are printed on every atom of me burnt in on every fiber until i die and for this my sin i doubt if ever though dust i be the dust will lose the desire the torment and hidden fire of my passionate love for you a zeeze whom i adore my dust will be full of your beauty as is the blue and infinite ocean full of the azure sky in the light that waxed and waned playing about your slumber in silver bars as the palm trees swung their feathery fronds of the stars how quiet and young you were pale as the chump of flowers violet veined that sweet and fading lay in your loosened hair how sweet you were in your sleep with the starlight on your hair your throat thrown backwards bare and touched with circling moonlight silver white on the couch's somber shade oh a zeeze my wonderlight when youth's passionate pulses fade and his golden heart beats slow when across the infinite sky i see the rosy eight glow of my last last sunset flare i shall send my thoughts to this night and remember you as i die the one thing among all the things of this world found fair how sweet you were in your sleep with the starlight silver and sable across your hair the first lover as over the vessel's side she lent she saw the swimmer in the sea with eager eyes on her intent come down come down and swim with me so weary was she of her lot tired of the ship's monotony she's straight away all the world forgot save the young swimmer in the sea so when the dusky dying light left all the water dark and dim she softly in the friendly night slipped down the vessel's side to him intent and brilliant brightly dark she saw his burning eager eyes and many a phosphorescent spark about his shoulders fall and rise as through the hushed and eastern night they swam together hand in hand or lay and laughed in sheer delight full length upon the level sand ah soft elusive purple night whose darkness knew no vexing moon ah cruel needless dawning light the tribbles in the sky too soon kanzata's song on the hillside the fires that burn on all the hills light up the landscape gray the arid desert land distills the fervors of the day the clear white moon sails through the skies and silvers all the night i see the brilliance of your eyes and need no other light the death size of a thousand flowers the fervent day is slain or wafted through the twilight hours and perfume all the plane my senses strain and try to clasp their sweetness in the air in vain in vain they only grasp the fragrance of your hair the plane is endless space expressed vast as the sky above i only feel against your breast infinities of love deserted gypsy's song hillside camp she is glad to receive your turquoise ring dear and dark eyed lover of mine i to have given you everything beauty mattins the soul like wine she is proud to have held aloof her charms slender dark eyed lover of mine but i of the night you lay in my arms beauty mattins the soul like wine she triumphs to think that your heart is one stately dark eyed lover of mine i had not a thought of myself not one beauty mattins the brain like wine she will speak you softly while skies are blue dear diluted lover of mine i would lose both body and soul for you beauty mattins the brain like wine while the ways are fair she will love you well dear disdainful lover of mine but i would have followed you down to hell beauty mattins the soul like wine though you lay at her feet the days to be now no longer lover of mine you can give her not that you gave not me beauty mattin my soul like wine when the years have shown what is false or true beauty mattins the sight like wine you will understand how i cared for you first and only lover of mine the planes how one loves them these wide horizons whether desert or sea vague and vast and infinite faintly clear surely hid in the far away unknown bear lie the things so longed for and found not found not here only where some passionate level land stretches itself in reaches of gold and sand only where the sea line is joined to the skyline clear beyond the curve of ripple or white foam crest shall the weary eyes distressed by the broken skies broken by minaret mountain or towering tree shall the weary eyes be assuaged be assuaged and rest lost to light after the hasara war i lie alone beneath the almond blossoms where we two lay together in the spring and now as then the mountain snows are melting this year as last the water courses sing that was another spring and other flowers hung pink and fragile on the leafless tree the land rejoiced in other running water and i rejoiced because you were with me you with your soft eyes darkly lashed and shaded your red lips like a living laughing rose your restless amber limbs so life and slender now lost to me gone wither no man knows you lay beside me singing in the sunshine the rough white fur unloosed at the neck showed the smooth skin fair as almond blossoms on which the sun could find no flaw or flak i lie alone beneath the almond flowers i hated them to touch you as they fell and now who killed you worse ah worse who loves you my soul is burning as men burn in hell how i have sought you in the crowded cities i have been mad they say for many days i not know how i came here to the valley what fate has led me through what doubtful ways somewhere i see my sword has done good service someone i killed who's smiling used your name but in what country nay i have forgotten all thought is shriveled in my heart's hot flame where are you now delight and where your beauty your subtle curls and laughing changeable face found bruised and naked dear god grant me patience and sold in Kabul in the marketplace i asked of you of all men who could tell me among so many captured sold or slain what fate was yours oh dear god grant me patience my heart is burnt is burnt with fire and pain oh lost a light my heart is almost breaking my sword is broken and my feet are sore the people look at me and say in passing he will not leave the village anymore for as the evening falls the fever rises with frantic thoughts careering through the brain wild thoughts of you ah dear god grant me patience my soul is hurt beyond all men call pain i lie alone beneath the almond blossoms and see the white snow melting on the hills till chorison is gay with water courses glad with the singling sound of running rills and well i know that when the fragile petals fall softly or the first green leaves appear ah for these last few days god grant me patience since delight is not i shall not be here in section five india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded for labor box by helen williford lauer section six india's love lyrics by laurence hope recorded by helen williford lauer this recording is in the public domain unforgotten do you ever think of me you who died are our youth's first fever chilled with your soft eyes and your pulses still lying alone aside do you ever think of me left in the light from the endless calm of your dawnless night i am faithful always i do not say that the lips which thrilled to your lips of old two lesser kisses are always cold had you wished for this in its narrow sense our love perhaps had been less intense but as we held faithfulness you and i i am faithful always as you who lie asleep forever beneath the grass while the days and nights and the seasons pass pass away i keep your memory near my heart my brilliant beautiful guiding star till long life over i too depart to the infinite night where perhaps you are oh are you anywhere loved so well i would rather know you alive in hell than think your beauty is nothing now with its deep dark eyes and tranquil brow where the hair fell softly can this be true that nothing nowhere exists of you nothing nowhere oh loved so well i have never forgotten do you still keep thoughts of me through your dreamless sleep oh gone from me lost in eternal night lost star of light risen splendidly set so soon through the weariness of life's afternoon i dream of your memory yet my loved and lost whom i could not save my youth went down with you to the grave though other planets and stars may rise i dream of your soft and sorrowful eyes and i cannot forget song of faiz ula just at the time when jasmine's bloom most sweetly in the summer weather lost in the scented jungle bloom one sultry night we spent together we love and night together blend a trinity of tranced content yet while your lips were holy mind to kiss to drink from to caress we heard some far off faint distress harsh drop of poison in sweet wine listening the fullness of delight some quivering note of human pain which rose and fell and rose again in plaintive sobs throughout the night spoiling the perfumed moonless hours we spent among the jasmine flowers story of lilavanti they lay the slender body down with all its wealth of wetted hair only a daughter of the town but very young and slight and fair the eyes whose light one cannot see are somber doubtless like the tresses the mouth soft curving seem to be a rosy it series of caresses and where the skin has all but dried the air is sultry in the room upon her breast and either side it shows a soft and amber bloom by women here who knew her life a leper husband i am told took all this loveliness to wife when it was barely 10 years old and when the child in shocked dismay fled from the hated husband's care he caught in tighter so they say down to his bedside by her hair to some low quarter of the town escaped a second time she flew her beauty brought her great renown and many lovers here she knew when as the mystic eastern night with purple shadow filled the air behind her window framed in light she sat with jasmine in her hair at last she loved a youth who chose to keep this wild flower for his own he and his garden set his rose where it might bloom for him alone cholera came her lover died want drove her to the streets again and women found her there who tried to turn her beauty into gain but she who in those garden ways had learnt of love would now no more be bartered in the marketplace for silver as in days before that former life she strove to change she sold the silver of her arms while all the world grew cold and strange to broken health and fading charms till finding lovers but no friend nor any place to rest or hide she grew despairing at the end slipped softly down a well and died and yet how short when all is said this little life of love and tears her age they say beside her bed today is only 15 years the garden by the bridge the desert sands are heated parched and dreary the tigers rend alive their quivering prey in the near jungle hear the kites rise weary too gorged with living food to fly away all night the hungry jackals howl together over the carrion in the riverbed or sees some small soft thing of fur or feather whose dying shrieks on the night air are shed i hear from yonder temple in the distance whose roof with obscene carbon gods is piled reiterated with a sad insistence sobs of perhaps some emulated child strange rites here where the archway's shade is deeper are consummated in the riverbed pariahs steal the rotten railway sleeper to burn the bodies of their cholera dead but yet their lust their hunger cannot shame them goaded by fierce desire that flays and stings poor beasts and poor men nay who shall blame them blame the inherent cruelty of things the world is horrible and i am lonely let me rest here where yellow roses bloom and find forgetfulness remembering only your face beside me in the scented gloom nay do not shrink i am not here for passion i crave no love only a little rest although i would my face lay lover's fashion against the tender coolness of your breast i am so weary of the curse of living the endless aimless torture tumult fears surely if life were any gods forgiving he seeing his gift long since went blind with tears seeing us our fruitless strife our futile praying our luckless present and our blood stained past poor players who make a trick or two in playing but know that death must win the game at last as round the fowler red with feathered slaughter the little joyous lark unconscious sings as the pink lotus floats on azure water innocent of the mud from wits it springs you walk through life unheating all the sorrow the fear and pain set close around your way meeting with hopeful eyes each gay tomorrow living with joy each hour of glad today i love to have you thus nay dear like quiet how should these reverent fingers wrong your hair so calmly careless of the russian riot that rages round is seething everywhere you do not understand you think your beauty does but inflame my senses to desire till all you hold is loyalty and duty is shrunk and shriveled in the ardent fire you wrong me worried out with thought and grieving as though the whole world's sorrow eat my heart i come to gaze upon your face believing its beauty is as ointment to the smart lie still and let me in my desolation caress the soft loose hair a moment span since loveliness is life's one consolation and love the only lethy left to man oh give me here beneath the trees and flower beside the river where the fireflies pass one little dusky all consoling hour lost in the shadow of the long grown grass give me oh you whose arms are soft and slender whose eyes are nothing but one long caress against your heart so innocent and tender a little love and some forgetfulness fate knows no tears just as the dawn of love was breaking across the weary world of gray just as my life once more was waking as roses waken late in may fate blindly cruel and habit making stepped in and carried you away memories have i none in keeping of times i held you near my heart of dreams when we were near to weeping the dawn should bid us rise and part nevertheless i saw you sleeping with soft closed eyes and lips apart breathing my name still through your dreaming oh had you stayed such things had been but fate unheeding human scheming serenely reckless came between fate with her cold eyes hard and gleaming unseared by all the sorrow seen oh well beloved i never told you i did not show in speech or song how at the end i longed to hold you close in my arms so fierce and strong the longing grew to have and hold you you and you only all life long they who know nothing call me fickle keen to pursue and loathe to keep all could they see these tears that trickle from eyes erstwhile too proud to weep could see me prone beneath the sickle while pain and sorrow stand and reap an open scarce yet overblown by the hopes that rose like round me grew the lights are low and more than lonely this life i lead apart from you come back come back i want you only and you who loved me never knew you loved me pleaded for compassion on all the pain i would not share and i in weary halting fashion was loath to listen long to care but now dear god i faint with passion for your far eyes and distant hair yes i am faint with love and broken with sleepless nights and empty days i want your soft words fiercely spoken your tender looks and wayward ways want that strange smile that gave me token of many things that no man says cold was i wary slow to waken till startled by your ardent eyes i felt the soul within me shaken and long forgotten senses rise but in that moment you were taken and thus we lost our paradise farewell we may not now recover that golden then misspent passed by we shall not meet as loved and lover here or hereafter you and i my time for loving you is over love has no future but to die and thus we part with no believing in any chance of future years we have no idle self-deceiving no half-consoling hopes and fears we know the gods grant no retrieving a wasted chance fate knows no tears versus baiz ula just in the hush before dawn a little wistful wind is born a little chilly errant breeze that thrills the grasses stirs the trees and as it wanders on its way while yet the night is cool and dark the first carol of the lark its plaintive murmurs seem to say i wake the sorrows of the day end section six andia's love lyrics by lauren's hope recorded by helen williford lauer this recording is in the public domain