Tapas

Like a white hanji stroke
left by a master calligrapher
on a black rice paper sheet

Like a still white thunderbolt
frozen in a starless night,
You meditate in a dark hall
of a hundred silent souls.

“You are a yogini,” I said.
“Not I,” you cried. “For tapa I dread.”

You were right to distrust a tryst
even in the name of dhyan,
with a withered man,
of broken teeth and bones of rust,
of white grey hair and suspected lust.

Smoke covers every blaze,
and with an expert whispered “no,”
you fanned away the haze.

What is left behind is just the flame.
Oh look, my sweet, for “Tapa” is its name.

When Brahma found himself in the dark,
in the lotus, alone, before the world began,
he heard that word; it was his spark.

By tapa he created,
by tapa does it mend,
and through that very tapa
Shiva brings about its end.

Tapa’s the fire at the base of the spine.
Tapa makes the vajra adamantine.
Tapa is what makes us and all this turn.
Tapa makes both our käma and our karma burn.
Tapa cleans the gold of dross,
Tapa is the Christian’s cross.

From tapa starts the work of prem,
Love tapa and there’s no fear or shame.
Tapa is brightness, tapa is light—
It’s your tapa that made you shine in my sight.

Part II

And this too is tapa—
the hunger that makes me look at you as you walk
or sit, or laugh, or look, or listen, or talk,
and makes my heart center expand and glow
without knowing if I will ever know
what this is all about.

This too is tapa—
When I sit in meditation and see your light
Like a Roman candle gushing up and out
Blue and bright from your heart to your head
And imagine two columns of light instead
intertwined and intermingled to make an inner sun
merge with the moon and making one.

And this too is tapa,
Where we go ever higher,
working this experiment
From earth to sky
and beyond the firmament.

.

The Two Circle Dances

viharati vane rādhā
sādhāraṇa-praṇaye harau
vigalita-nijotkarṣād
īrṣyā-vaśena gatā'nyataḥ
kvacid api latā-kuñje
guñjan-madhu-vrata-maṇḍalī-
mukhara-śikhare līnā

dīnāpy uvāca rahaḥ sakhīm

When Radha saw Hari frolick in the forest,
treating all the women with equal affection,
she felt her own special status melt away.
Jealousy and rage arose in her, and off she went.

Somewhere, in a vine covered bower,
where bees buzzed in circles overhead,
she hid, and forlorn in her solitude,
began confiding in a friend.

kaṁsārir api saṁsāra-vāsanā-baddha-śṛṅkhalām
rādhām ādāya hṛdaye tatyāja vraja-sundarīḥ

Krishna, the enemy of Kamsa,
took Radha to his heart, knowing she
is the link that bundles all his worldly wants,
and left the other girls behind.

itas tatas tām anusṛtya rādhikām
anaṅga-bāṇa-vraṇa-khinna-mānasaḥ
kṛtānutāpaḥ sa kalinda-nandinī-
taṭānta-kuñje viṣasāda mādhavaḥ

Madhava looked for Radhika everywhere,
his mind burning with the wounds
inflicted by the arrows of Cupid.

Overcome with remorse, he came to a bower
by the banks of the Yamuna
and began to lament.

==================================

And so the eternal cycle begins.
What is the difference between
the Rasas of the autumn and the spring?

The first tells of God and the jiva,
the second of God and his hladini;
the former, an archetype of the spiritual path,
the latter, of the divine comedy.

Both are circle dances,
revolving in opposite senses:
The Bhagavata is the circle without,
Gita Govinda, the one within.

Krishna is the axis of the outer,
Radha, of the inner.

Together, They are
the center of both.

==================================

Without the balance of the two circles,
like unaligned gears, they cause
the machine to wobble and shake:
There is a frenzy of duality,
a great missing of the point,
a great failure of madhurya.

Become a god to worship God.
While God becomes a man.
Whirl a while in both those circles,
but look for the eye of the storm.

==================================

Revised and updated from HERE, where there is also some additional info.

After Dana Lila

After just a day of Rai’s silence
Kanai began to lose control.
This really is no way to be,
he thought, I am the Supersoul.

Scrambling up to the grizzled top
of Govardhan, across the puzzled haze
he could see the shimmering white
washed walls of Nandishwar, and beyond
he thought he saw Varshana
float mirage-like into sight.

And then, Javat beyond, and Radha there,
silently sweeping floors and churning curds,
her veiled head turned always downwards,
inwards, where she watched, aware
of Banamali waiting, watching
back on Govardhan.

Radha holed up in her home, no more
promenades to Madhupuri market.
Vigilant husband,
nosy nanad,
meretricious mother-in-law,
all creating invisible wall circles
mantra circles round and round
the one of brick and govar,
round and round the one of Vedic law
that stands impregnable,
even in this carefree gopa gopi world.
They held her prisoner.

I don’t need you, Krishna calls out,
in a momentary fit of heroic,
dramatic, childish pique.
I know how to be alone!

What aberration of creative power
has taken him from infinity to finity?
from being the yogic light
of a million simultaneous suns
into this world of darkness?

In some corner of his endless soul,
he regrets having become so temporal:
I could have stayed up in my sky
and been One in my Oneness,
Full in my Fullness,
Complete in my Completeness,
so Neat in my philosophical Neatness!!

Passing nights in hollow trees,
making cuckoo sounds and hooting like an owl,
is so below the dignity
of the Supersoul.

The anxious high pitched koil calls
grate and prick on Kanai's chest.
Why not use my powers, my mystic might?
My flute could conquer all free will,
and set all things a-right
if that was what I chose.

But if he is to be himself,
he must find another way.
In his omniscience he knows.

He too must face reality.
In his omniscience he knows.

Today I saw Sri Radha

Today I saw Sri Radha.
I watched her walking on the path
between Javat and Nanda Gaon.
Her head was uncovered
and her braid dangled behind her
like a python from the branches of a tree.

Like all Vrajavasis,
her easy gait was quick
as she sped to Nandishwar.
She was fast as Garuda, faster than the mind,
followed by a flock of golden Garudas,
surrounded by a sky of lightning strokes
in the dry landscape.

Too fast to talk they almost trot,
their ghaghras behind them streak
like starry, mirrored flags of passion.

The jingling of anklebells,
the tinkling of laughter,
the risque barbs and teasing,
the bits and bribes of songs
trail them like a cloud.

Radha is going to cook
at Yasho Rani’s house
and I struggle to keep up.

Years of aching wishes
caressed that sight.
I felt you there in that smaran;
we watched Rai Kishori's bobbing braids
and the flowing, mocking rainbow
of her friends.

The morning sun has suddenly begun
to pour its heat on Nandagaon.
The dust powder is so fine
you can almost taste it on your tongue
where Rai has touched it with her toes.

And then, against the sun-stained walls,
baked like pueblos on the flattened sky,
Kahnai casts his cooling cloud,
shyam shadow light.

He loiters by the yellow gate,
his arm resting on Subal’s arm.
In one hand he slowly twirls a flower,
nonchalant, as a cowherd prince should be.

Saying nothing, he devours
Radha with his eyes.

She pulls her veil over her head.
She turns her head shyly, slow,
slyly giving him a crooked glance,
shy enough to make him want to dance.

She quivers, trembles, she is unnerved,
his gaze is unwavering and strong.
Do we have to go this way, she asks,
is there no other door?
Afraid she’ll trip, Lalita grabs her hand.
Watch your feet, she says. Watch your mind.

Krishna's gaze does not break,
as if this is the first time
these four bee-like eyes have ever met.
And yet it is--their every glance
a first Cupid arrow fired,
another first wave in eternity.

I bathed in all of that today, and the sight
has filled my every pore.
And now, at night, I feel you pervading me
like Vraja's rasika sun,
bhava and prema, liquid light,
inundate my core.

Here I chant the Holy Name,
these flames pervade my heart and brain.
I see the Yugala's everlasting play
and you pervade my every vein.

This is us and this is them;
it’s a disgrace people will say,
but I don’t see a difference any more.
It's become a sadharani-karan
of two, this time, not one.

Hail the Heroic Losers

Hail the heroic losers,
the poets who proudly point
to the faith-shaped hole
they so nobly fail to fill.

They sigh and shake their heads,
Holes are full of emptiness
they say, and then, world-weary,
turn to the tired trivia
of another day's distractions.

The worst are filled with zeal;
the best struck with ennui,
and before pretending with politics,
they discharge disdain
and condescension
into their void.
That's life.

Thank God there's no final
failure, no end, only delay.
I pray the vastava-vastu
fills their gaping space today.

The Cloud Messenger

Unwell all day in body and mind,
licking my wounds by looking for rhymes.
The rain came down at quarter to four.

I did not realize until quite late that night,
the drumbeat of rain was really a code:
Devi had sent a messenger cloud.
Decrypted, her voice came through, clear and bold,
and this is what her letter told:

O Manjari! You're at least 12 by now.
You're old enough to know better.

It is strange you have to be told
that you and the sakhis, not I, hold
the lila in the palms of your hands.
Don't you know your role?

You're not there just to sweep the kunja,
or stop Krishna from coming in when Lalita scolds.
You're not there just to wait for nectar to fall.
Don't you know what seva and dasi mean?
Who's the servant and who's the Queen?

O Dasi!
Krishna was speaking to you that night
when he told Arjuna he had to fight!
You too have a field of work, so do;
Work your field of duty, kuru.

Do you think it was easy for Arjuna to fight?
But he was a warrior and that was his right;
while Radha's just a kula bala,
a woman with a thousand badha,
a family that holds her bound in knots,
they hold her tight behind four walls;
Jatila and Kutila and the family cows
keep her out of Krishna's sight.

Whatever the pravasa, far or near, long or short,
whatever the maan, with a cause or not,
It's up to you to find a way.
The Jugal milan is your task;
I don't know why you had to ask!

Find a way, it's up to you--
Hide Krishna in a box!
Get in the door, pick the locks!
Dress him up as a goddess or a girl,
Have him make a garden of pearls.
Be a duti, do your duty, find a way!
You're not the audience, you're in the play!

The doors to Vraja are open wide
and if you die trying, at least,
at least you can say you tried.

The fun is all in getting it done.
I, Yogamaya, am your servant, the Lila is yours;
Radha and Krishna meet at your command.
Find them in the woods where they hanker afar;
Take them by the hand and do abhisar.
I promise you'll see the Nitya Vihara.

You were probably surprised to hear from me.
My message is this: You are free! You are free!

Chandra Vadani

This is the top of the mountain.
We walked the last kilometer, and there were stairs,
so no alpinist heroics, but the air is thin
enough to make our heads all spin.

We look down on freewheeling falcons
flying far above the terraced slopes.

Wisps of cloud cling to neighbor peaks
like the yaksha's doot, resting weary from his trip,
waiting maybe for more messages to bring
the beloved, who wanes upon the snowy summits
that trim the no longer lost horizon.

Devi mantras, dhaks and dhols,
sussurating Sapta-shati, bellows and bells.
I buy my coconut and bring it to you,
Devi Chandravadani.

O Yoga Maya, I am with you again,
under this pale and crystal sky.
Like I was in Vrindavan,
in elated circumambulation;
Like I was in in Nabadwip,
under the midnight black and tangled
branches of Pora Ma.

I am praying once again for what you have,
with which you tantalize, but never give;
I beg you: apavrinu apavrinu.

From here on high, Paurnamasi Devi,
from this tiny particle of Govardhan,
from this place where you cover the universe
with your dancing veils of illusion,
I am praying again, apavrinu apavrinu.

With straw in my mouth, I ask you this:
Why do you separate the Divine Couple?
Why do you make them vagabond apart,
lost in thorn and snake-filled Vrindavan?
Why do you make Radha wear this maan?
And make Krishna powerless, like a captured thief,
who begs the trees and birds, and you, for relief?

Can't you make it simple, fling open wide the drape,
and show us their divine, eternal, joyous state?
It seems you like this keeping them apart.
I know it's all a question of your art,
but this Lila's weighing heavy on my heart...
Devi, apavrinu apavrinu.