Celebration of Being Alive: Happy New Year

(This poem is dedicated to those who have fire in their heart.

The fire..the passion to know "why am I living in the world''..

I wish may the coming year bring the fruits of their pursuit.)

After the long restless nights of enigmatic dreams

After the drowsy hours of the slumbering mind

Yet to decide “am I still dreaming or awakened?”

There was herald I sensed…

Before I was aware that was not dream

I saw the existence revived all around

In wildness of chirping birds

In the blooming petal of the dewed flower

In the wonderful smell of the wet earth

In the scintillating coolness of still air

When wondering eyes focused on the distant

There was ruby sky on the remote east

And wandering clouds in the far horizon

My heart brightened gradually with remote sky

Getting colored slowly with rambling clouds

Dancing wildly with the blooming rose in subtle breeze

Such a synchronicity everywhere!!

My heart had yet to collect those esoteric feelings

My body yet to receive the awesome sensations

Ah! There was the apex of romance

Between the rising sun and the silent Himalaya

.

When I noticed the rays kissing the white Himalaya

My heart became Himalaya

Dissolving gradually and gradually

Radiating slowly and slowly with golden blush

With the caressing of the loving rays

And dancing in the rhythm of soundless music

(courtesy: www.spiritofthehimalayas.com)

I said to myself

Wait! Wait!!

I have yet to notice

The hardness vanishing in my heart

The questions dissolving in my mind

The curiosity diluting in the sentiments

With the charisma of blushing Himalaya?

Or the overwhelming emotion of the dancing heart??

In the mean time

I found...

There were my eyes

Bursting with rapture of the overflowing tears

Flooded with joy of unknown emotions

Then I understood the first time..

Why am still living in the world?

Divine Romance - II

After long restless search for his guru in his teen age time, Yogananda met his guru in an implausible circumstance at the narrow street of Banaras. When I went through at first time, I couldnot continue anymore without letting my emotion to subside. Everytime I read these paragraphs, I feel wonderful sensation in me. The following paragraphs discribe the glimses of thier first union. ( from book: An Autobiography of a Yogi)
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...Another day I might have replied impatiently; now I wiped my tear- swollen face and meekly obeyed the summons. Together Habu and I set out for a distant market place in the Bengali section of Benares. The ungentle Indian sun was not yet at zenith as we made our purchases in the bazaars. We pushed our way through the colorful medley of housewives, guides, priests, simply-clad widows, dignified Brahmins, and the ubiquitous holy bulls. Passing an inconspicuous lane, I turned my head and surveyed the narrow length.
A Christlike man in the ocher robes of a swami stood motionless at the end of the road. Instantly and anciently familiar he seemed; my gaze fed hungrily for a trice. Then doubt assailed me. "You are confusing this wandering monk with someone known to you," I thought.

"Dreamer, walk on." After ten minutes, I felt heavy numbness in my feet. As though turned to stone, they were unable to carry me farther. Laboriously I turned around; my feet regained normalcy. I faced the opposite direction; again the curious weight oppressed me. "The saint is magnetically drawing me to him!" With this thought, I heaped my parcels into the arms of Habu. He had been observing my erratic footwork with amazement, and now burst into laughter. "What ails you? Are you crazy?" My tumultuous emotion prevented any retort; I sped silently away. Retracing my steps as though wing-shod, I reached the narrow lane. My quick glance revealed the quiet figure, steadily gazing in my direction. A few eager steps and .....I was at his feet.

"Gurudeva!"

The divine face was none other than he of my thousand visions. These halcyon eyes, in leonine head with pointed beard and flowing locks, had oft peered through gloom of my nocturnal reveries, holding a promise I had not fully understood.
"O my own, you have come to me!" My guru uttered the words again and again in Bengali, his voice tremulous with joy. "How many years I have waited for you!"
We entered a oneness of silence; words seemed the rankest superfluities. Eloquence flowed in soundless chant from heart of master to disciple. With an antenna of irrefragable insight I sensed that my guru knew God, and would lead me to Him. The obscuration of this life disappeared in a fragile dawn of prenatal memories. Dramatic time! Past, present, and future are its cycling scenes. This was not the first sun to find me at these holy feet!
My hand in his, my guru led me to his temporary residence in the Rana Mahal section of the city. His athletic figure moved with firm tread. Tall, erect, about fifty-five at this time, he was active and vigorous as a young man. His dark eyes were large, beautiful with plumbless wisdom. Slightly curly hair softened a face of striking power. Strength mingled subtly with gentleness. As we made our way to the stone balcony of a house overlooking the Ganges, he said affectionately: "I will give you my hermitages and all I possess."

"Sir, I come for wisdom and God-contact. Those are your treasure- troves I am after!" The swift Indian twilight had dropped its half-curtain before my master spoke again. His eyes held unfathomable tenderness. "I give you my unconditional love." Precious words! A quarter-century elapsed before I had another auricular proof of his love. His lips were strange to ardor; silence became his oceanic heart.

"Will you give me the same unconditional love?" He gazed at me with childlike trust.

"I will love you eternally, Gurudeva!"

"Ordinary love is selfish, darkly rooted in desires and satisfactions. Divine love is without condition, without boundary, without change. The flux of the human heart is gone forever at the transfixing touch of pure love." He added humbly, "If ever you find me falling from a state of God-realization, please promise to put my head on your lap and help to bring me back to the Cosmic Beloved we both worship."………………………

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Divine Romance

Love is the ingredient of life, romance is its active expression and the longing is the realization of its importance. I was always thrilled and fascinated while reading the love　stories during my earlier college time. It was beautiful experience where I could observe my emotional appeared in my heart in the course of reading them. During those times, I learned the another dimension of love- quite different from the one I used to get from my parents- where the pain and happiness merges in one; more the pain of longing, more the out-coming happiness. From the diverse literature I went through, be it Munamadan to Mukund-Indira, or Women in Love to Anna Karenina, the quality of newly discovered love is same; more the sense of giving and understanding, sweeter becomes the story. All of these writers unanimously identified the quality of love in devotion and unconditional nature. By and by, I encountered yet another dimension of love through some ‘intoxicated’ writers/poems like Tagore, Rumi, Umar Khayyam, Khalil Gibran, where the heart longs for their undiscovered beloved; another quality of love in which the ‘self’ intends to dissolve totally with beloved. Their stories were awesome and incredible. The same quality of love, more graspable yet, was also discovered between the seeker, in the quest of self realization and the Master who inspires and accelerates his journey. Their stories were heart-blowing. Because of the avalanche of the surprising emotional, my eyes used to overflow by the tears and it was impossible to read the next episode. And ah! I like to admit that these stories ignited the esoteric fire in me.

Here, I like share few paragraphs from such story. It is the portion of the story when a seeker (Yogananda) was in search of his guru, wandered everywhere and finally　met him (Yukteshwor) at the street of Banaras in an implausible circumstance. .

To be continued....