Sweet Prince(ss)

"Sweet Princess, while being caressed, enter everlasting life" - Vigyan Bhairav Tantra

This is a verse that I love to use. Andries du Toit, who loves that I use it, wrote the following exquisite poem, which I have to share with you.

To a guide

“Sweet Princess —”

I say the name: ancient words, anonymous.

One man’s name for

one unknown woman, lost in the drift of years.

Someone’s heart was pierced. Someone

met one day a shy-bold curious glance;

or saw her naked back

golden in the sunlit water; or saw

all in a moment, in the fierce ecstatic dance,

her graceful dusty feet, the hollow of her throat, sweat on her skin;

or someone heard, once

— just once —

a woman’s voice

a throaty chuckle in another room

behind a paper screen.

We don’t know what happened, or who

fell in love with whom.

We know that matter yearned for matter, that a body

found itself unfinished, opened: found itself

mortal, undone, bereft —

and found that longing sweet.

They are gone now, dust, forgotten. But

that sweetness lives. That sudden opening,

that being-lost, still speaks. Words

are a channel. So are bodies. Today

one specific body, one woman, one mortal self

awakes, finds courage, enters the dance. The heart

welcomes the heart. Life

caresses life. One broken body —

particular and frail, unfinished, beautiful —

opens to itself. Invites delight. Becomes

Sweet Princess: Universal. Mortal. Tender. Brave. Beloved.

- Andries, 28 February 2009, flight SA 208, somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.