midnight
And so as we all stood waiting in the dusk , I and the lotuses and the sun , all at once I heard behind me a voice like a _ kokila _ , saying quietly : I have kept thee a long while waiting : wilt thou forgive ? And I turned round , and looked , and lo ! there was a lady , looking at me with a smile . And she was standing so absolutely still , that she resembled an image made of copper , for exactly like the lotuses , she was all red in the rays of the sun , and her dark clothing shone like the leaf of a palm seen at midnight in the glow of a fire . And her hair was massed like that of an ascetic high over her brow , and on its dull black cloud there shone a gem that resembled a star , shooting and flickering and changing colour like a diamond mixed with an opal : while underneath , her eyes , that resembled pools filled with dusk instead of water , were fixed on me as if in meditation , as if half in doubt as to whether I was I. And yet her lips were smiling , not as if they meant to smile , but just because they could not help it , driven by the sweetness of the soul that lay behind them to betray its secret unawares . And the perfect oval of the outline of her face was lifted , so to say , into the superlative degree of soft fascination by a faint suggestion of the round ripeness of a fruit in its bloom , as if the Creator , by some magical extra touch of his chisel , had wished to exclaim : See how the full loveliness of a woman surpasses the delicate promise of a girl ! And she was rather tall , and she stood up very straight indeed , so straight , that my heart laughed within me as I looked at her , for sheer delight , so admirably upright was the poise of her figure , and yet so round and delicious was the curve of her arms and her slender waist , that rose as if with exultation into the glorious magnificence of her splendid breast , on which her left hand rested , just touching it very lightly with the tips of her fingers , like a wind-blown leaf lying for a moment exactly at the point of junction of two mounds of snow , as if to chide it very gently for challenging the admiration of the three worlds .