Part II of the albatross poem by the Dutch poet Dèr Mouw

II

Longing’s lurchings have gashed a mighty rift

in soul’s torn surface, normally so smooth;

emerging from oblivion’s grey ooze,

wreck upon wreck, old memories now drift;

and madness, on whose wave-crests’ flexed awryness

in flickering dance wild fantasies abound,

its sledge seems to knock crumbling slabs of ground

loose from a continent of quaking I-ness.

Rising to ecstasy from deep despair

around the fearful one held captive there

insistent rings of waves constrict at will...

free Self-Awareness though of Brahman’s Being,

that witnesses its worldly fears unfleeing,

drifts in triumphant balance, calmly still.