The Chapel in the Cradle of Clouds
— A Romantic Ode by Dr.Lal Karun —
I.
O dome that leans to kiss the sabled air,
Thy spire like dream’s own taper finely drawn,
Thou stand’st where none but angels sweetly dare,
Upon a hill of alabaster dawn.
How pale the hush upon thy windows rest,
Like roseate blushes on a virgin breast.
II.
The moon hath spilled her milk upon the snow,
While slumb’ring pines with diamond eyelids lie,
And o’er thy door, a candle’s inward glow
Burns like a soul not yet resigned to die.
A furnace deep within the frost’s embrace—
How fervent fire wears love’s eternal face!
III.
O gentle vault of storm and velvet sky,
Thy breath hath swaddled peaks in azure woe;
Yet midst the fury, still the chapel high
Doth warm the very air with pinkish glow.
No wrath of winter dares its peace unmake,
For love hath laid its arms ‘round roof and stake.
IV.
Where clouds like softest seraph garments sweep,
The quiet steeple keeps its patient ward,
While from the eaves, the frozen petals weep—
Each flake a kiss from Nature’s holy bard.
O what is heaven but a hill made still,
Where beauty’s hush makes breath and thought to spill?
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V.
Thou temple small, with grandeur not of gold,
But built of grace, of shadow, and of snow,
No stately marble could thy poise uphold,
Nor cities sing the peace thy moments know.
In solitude thou teach’st the soul to bend,
To pray not for, but with, the wind its friend.
VI.
A painter’s ache, a sculptor’s yearnèd hand,
Could not recapture half thy silent fire;
The rapture here doth not obey command,
But stirs as pulse, and lifts the heart entire.
Each breeze that stirs around thy porch and door
Whispers of truths no tongue could e’er implore.
VII.
The sky, a vault of ink and burning blue,
Bears down with stars like candles in a trance;
And thou, lone church, art sentinel and true,
A beacon dressed in love’s ethereal dance.
O how thy warmth bleeds through the aching chill,
And draws the lost toward thee from yonder hill.
VIII.
Thou look’st not on the world with prideful face,
Nor call’st the winds to fan thy proudest flame;
Thy glory lies in stillness and in grace—
In how thou art, not what men shout thy name.
And so the snow, and so the storm, relent—
To lie as worshippers, in silence spent.
IX.
The mountains rise like gods in sleep profound,
Their brows enfrosted with celestial age,
But ’tis thy lamp that holds the world spell-bound,
The modest flame that steals the poet’s page.
For vastness doth not always rouse the soul,
But something small, and secretly made whole.
X.
I walked amidst the hush with burdened mind,
Each step a tear, each breath a dying rose,
Till came I to thy haven, still and kind,
And knelt as dreams do when their moment goes.
Thy presence was not loud, but deep, and bare—
A hush more potent than the fiercest prayer.
XI.
What bells ring out within thy unseen heart?
What choir of snowflakes chant within thy nave?
I felt my doubts and dreams alike depart,
As if thy roof had made me less a slave.
O beauty, here thou art in cloister held,
With every ghost of pain and sorrow quelled.
XII.
The lilac hush of twilight’s trembling thread
Falls like a ribbon round thy steepled crown,
While winds in love their wildest phrases shed,
But dare not rend thy pale and holy gown.
Thou art not moved, and yet the world revolves,
As if thy stillness time itself absolves.
XIII.
O let me lay where frost has carved the pine,
Where branches reach like arms that seek to pray,
And gaze upon thy walls—half flame, half shrine—
Till sleep and soul as one might drift away.
A bed of snow, a pillow wrought from sky—
No sweeter place to dream, no place to die.
XIV.
How like a star thou burn’st within the mist,
No throne more true than that of mount and cloud;
What prince could boast such honor to exist
Where Heaven’s silence sings more sweet than crowd?
Thou art the soul’s cathedral built by breath,
A still defiance to the storm and death.
XV.
O winter! Lay thy fiercest hand aside,
And learn from yonder steeple how to hold;
Thy blizzards break, but here doth love abide,
Its altar warmer than thy silver cold.
What use hath rage ‘gainst beauty’s quiet light?
She conquers not with war, but holy sight.
XVI.
And in the dawn, when streaks of saffron burst,
Like bleeding fruit across the mountain’s side,
Still stands that chapel, flushed as if it thirst
To welcome day with all its soul and pride.
No word it speaks, no banner doth it raise,
Yet all the heavens blush beneath its gaze.
XVII.
I do believe that somewhere God has wept
To see such beauty bloom without acclaim;
That He, through winter’s tapestry, has crept
To light thy windows with His quiet flame.
And we, in passing, feel what saints have known:
That truth is oft in corners overgrown.
XVIII.
O house of breath! O lamp in twilight’s face!
Thy slender form has carved into my heart
A place no worldlier shrine shall e’er replace—
Where silence sings and no dream comes apart.
Thou teach’st the soul to see, and not to seek,
To find in snow the strength of what is meek.
XIX.
Let those who chase the golden domes of kings
Find joy in clang and marble’s polished boast,
But I shall stay where frosted stillness sings,
And drink the spirit of thy shadowed host.
What joy is more than this: to simply be,
With thee, beneath the gaze of majesty?
XX.
The winds may howl, the avalanche may slide,
The valley quake beneath the mountain’s scream—
Yet here, thy flame shall never break or hide,
But shine as in some old and sainted dream.
O let me be a ghost that haunts thy light,
To walk thy paths through every endless night.
XXI.
And if I live to see a hundred years,
Let none be more than what I saw today:
A chapel flushed with heaven’s tender tears,
A hill that wore the blue of gods at play.
The world may roar—but I, once still with thee,
Shall hold thy hush as immortality.
XXII.
No echo here but silence clothed in breath,
No glory loud, but soft as lambent coals—
Where beauty walks with time, and mocks at death,
And Love keeps vigil in the drifting shoals.
Thy lamp may dim, but never will it cease,
For beauty kindled here becomes our peace.
XXIII.
And now I go, my heart a painted scroll,
Inscribed with hues the stars themselves have known;
Thy image haunts me, perfect, pale, and whole—
A chapel where the winds have carved their own.
But fear I not the parting of our thread—
For beauty lives though all but hope is dead.
XXIV.
Farewell, fair light, thou blossom of the snow!
Though feet must fall from this enchanted crest,
Thy flame shall in my memory ever glow,
A candle planted deep within my chest.
O Chapel high! In thee I found my start—
A poem standing still, and shaped like heart.
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