Sarojini Naidu’s speaker likens her heart to a delicately carved alabaster box, something beautiful but easily broken, as fragile as a cassia flower. The box is not empty or merely decorative; it has been shaped by “delicate dreams” and “subtle and exquisite thought,” suggesting an inner life full of sensitivity and care. Inside, she keeps not physical objects but the lasting perfume of experience—passionate memories blended like cinnamon, sandal, and clove. Those warm, rich scents stand for song, sorrow, life, and love. The mood is intimate and gently melancholic: the speaker treasures what she has felt, even the painful parts, holding them close as something precious. There is tenderness in the image of guarded, fragrant memory, but also a quiet awareness that such a heart is vulnerable precisely because it has been so finely made and so deeply filled.
Alabaster — Summary
Like this alabaster box whose art Is frail as a cassia-flower, is my heart, Carven with delicate dreams and wrought With many a subtle and exquisite thought.
Therein I treasure the spice and scent Of rich and passionate memories blent Like odours of cinnamon, sandal and clove, Of song and sorrow and life and love.