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Predominantly, we encounter compounds in which conventional spiritual qualities are allied either with other spiritual attributes or with more general aspects of nature: perfection love, oneness-might, acceptance-joy, aspiration-flame, hope-bud, vastness-shower, beauty-rays. Common, too, are compounds in which emotions are brought into focus by their grammatical subordination to a powerful, concrete noun: terror-rod, frustrationbark, confusion-knot, division-pipe, gratitude-gong. The poet also uses compounds to specify a certain human quality in his relationship with the world or with abstract qualities: motherearth, brother-world, sister-moon, faith-friend; doubt-foe. The poet is especially fond of compound forms to reveal something of the inexpressible nature of God: Saviour-Friend, Maker-Lord, God-Fire, Friend-Love, Silence-God. In another, more ambiguous usage, the poet forges a spiritual meaning from objects that do not have any intrinsic spiritual value: nectar-sea, dream-boat, venom-knife, earth-clay, titan-lance, body-gaol, ladder-height, circus-delight, breath-tower.

The poet's resourcefulness is far wider than such a brief survey would indicate. For, essentially, the creation of compound nouns is an analogous device and, like all spiritual poets, he must look to the simplest of physical, chemical, biological and human analogies to carry his meaning. His plenary sense of the world brings to the poems an extraordinary abundance and fertility of images. We find him looking to nature-rain, the ocean, a tiny drop, the mysterious source of rivers; to flowers-the rose and the lotus, the bud and the fruit; to birds-their soaring flight, their return to the nest; to the sun and its rays; to fire and snow; thunder and lightning. We see him drawing upon aspects of the day and of the seasons; upon the cosmic terms and upon terms of measurement and definition. We touch upon a range of man-made objects: gate, tower, palace, chariot, toy, doll-and we contemplate the span of human activity: sigh, smile, frown, dance, err-brace, play, run, sing, sleep. All of life would seem to be caught up in an interlocking structure which is founded upon the miniature world of the compound noun, analogy at its most compact and intense level. The compound noun stands as a recognition of the esemplastic power of the imagination, which awakens the multiform nature of each thought and searches for its most perfect presentation. Since the poet's apprehensions are simultaneous rather than consecutive, so he instinctively selects a form which embodies that singleness of vision.