Life is the daughter of Delight is about the origin of the force of life. In this poem, Sri Aurobindo is not describing anything personal but simply the secret truth of life. She is the daughter of delight and hence always seeks delight even in the apparently most difficult conditions.
But the poem that you mention, ‘My life is wasted’, describes the sudden kindling of the flame of Love in the heart for the unnameable One. Sri Aurobindo describes how the very love that men find sweet and kind has tortured his heart by the insatiable longing for the One beyond Name and Form. He describes how the flame of love has been kindled in his heart that was otherwise cold (void of what is usually called love). And now that the flame has been kindled without his asking for it, he knows no way to quench it. This flame (of love) cannot be quenched by anything (except the beloved). Even heaven and its joys lose interest for someone in whom this flame is lit. He suffers feeling the pangs of hell due to the pain of separation and longing. Nor can he rebel at the delay but simply wait; for once the flame of love is lit nothing short of the union can fulfil it. Without the Beloved, life seems a waste.
Here is the poem written in Baroda around 1901.
‘My life is wasted like a lamp ablaze Within a solitary house unused,
My life is wasted and by Love men praise
For sweet and kind. How often have I mused
What lovely thing were love and much repined
At my cold bosom moved not by that flame.
’Tis kindled; lo, my dreadful being twined
Round one whom to myself I dare not name.
I cannot quench the fire I did not light
And he that lit it will not; I cannot even
Drive out the guest I never did invite;
Although the soul he dwells with loses heaven.
I burn and know not why; I sink to hell
Fruitlessly and am forbidden to rebel.’
(Ref. https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/02/my-life-is-wasted)
Affectionately,
Alok Da
