“To maintain world peace – love your neighbor and have a good heart.”
(Mother Teresa, 28 August 1982)

I felt light on my way back from Pune, buoyed up from the quiet inner resonance of joy, a knowing. The understanding is very subtle and elusive, defies description, but felt in many ways such that it becomes obvious. We can say only what it isn't, reflected in something, somehow. That is why The Awakening first of all has to destroy everything - all the conscious thoughts, sub-conscious tendencies or super-conscious enthusiasm. One drifts away into an ethereal world, loses track of space and time and the reality of the surroundings. I am here but I am not here. I am alive or dead or something else...

Neighbors

“You opened the door
with a frown, scared
then helplessly invited me in
to a room with T.V.
but there were no stars
in your eyes.
I wanted a smile,
You served me tea
with biscuits...
made by the unknown hands
of a stranger,
remaining a stranger.
Only a wall of bricks
separates us,
but we stay indoors
inside our little little planets
thinking, each in our own way…
What is wrong?”

“The challenge to live together lies in the recognition of interconnectedness. It suggests a leap into a larger selfhood. Not knowing that consciousness is One, we vainly believe that we can be happy and remain unaffected by the sadness all around.”

“We all say
right things in the wrong way
and understanding eludes us
for that life
beyond the shackles of time.
The serpent did not come
from nowhere suddenly,
we ignored The True One
and awareness of polarity,
painful duality
grew within and became
an obstinate habit.
Destiny is not altered
by a mere event of time
but every road and every lane
still takes us round and round
the decaying cemeteries of existence.
Sometimes, only sometimes
Joy beckons
in brief glimpses of beauty
and fleeting sensations of bliss.”

The consciousness of lovers is not dual but symbolic of a Oneness which Hollywood and Bollywood greedily exploit. It is that energy of Oneness that brings them together and is forever eluding them whenever they think they are two. There is an innate need in us to overcome the stifling feeling of being isolated and Gadzookz knows there are millions of things that still preserve the process of estrangement.

“Your love today
is like a sigh and a shadow,
I longingly want to know
hold fast and never let go...
Just to see you smile,
Just to hear you speak,
Just to share your dreams,
Just to laugh at this silly life,
Wondering, who gambled
away a treasure
and decided to play this joke
called love, or whadevah...
Only for those rules of fate
lay heavy on our hearts
even muscles of iron
could not bend.
It has become
a huge teardrop
on Somebody's cheek
because you choose your pride
refuse to give in, and then
it’s a traffic jam inside.”

We were gliding down G. S. Road.¹ Randy was busy squabbling with Sakuda as he wanted to take the steering wheel, while I blissfully watched the tall pine trees passing by in the back seat of the car, enjoying the music.

I watch the tides of the Barapani¹ lake. The water, so serene in the distance. The little waves, slowly rolling in, approaching nearer, growing in strength until they splash against our submerged toes, feeling warm from the afternoon sun. Behind us, the land gently climbs away to meet a faint blue sky from dispersed clouds. The sun slowly sets and there is coldness spreading all about in the darkening dusk. Across the night lies tomorrow but I can already see some faint sparkling of its promises. Our falling from grace was nothing but the failure of our efforts to climb to a higher realm. This time, rising once again, with accumulated passion and more strength of love we will traverse another layer of the infinite sky.

“Everything is filled
with an intense longing
This wind and these pine trees
yearning to be one.
A slowly growing need
rising in me to fulfill itself,
Someone coming closer
to embrace me and melt me
with the heat of desire,
fuelled by feral hungers
and a persistent fantasy.
Wounds of my heart
that open and close
with every waxing and waning of the moon
leave me wondering
why we are given dreams
that refuse to come true?
Haunted by the stars
of bleak night skies -
an illusion of time.”

“To be recognized for what WE ARE is the way out of this CHAKRA VIEW. Millions of aspirations in trillions of hearts but only one dream trying to realize itself in countless ways. A transition into a clearer awareness. A state where the means and the end are one. Not a struggle to reach for something, but simply being in full bloom to quietly observe the eternal dance of life.”

“His heart still contains
remnants of stupidity
and popular prejudice,
yet he aspires
for permanent love.
What he deserves
He doesn't get,
all those invested emotions -
miseries of attachment.
He hardly cares for others
but only when he wants,
or else his arrogant honesty
would have set him free.
The willingness to stay submerged
in an ocean of mystery,
taking nothing, giving all
ability to float in a sky
of too much freedom.
He is not the only one
in search of a Holy Grail
but too many miles
of walking,
has made his feet very sore.”

You are supposed to be MINDLESS over here. Since nothing is quite enjoyable, you simply walk out there and do it - like an automaton, unaware, unfeeling, as if in a stupor. The alternative takes courage - a deadly kind of courage, aware of the dangers of swimming completely against the current. One cannot struggle or conform - all that is left behind and reduced to garbage becoming compost. The rewards come straight and everything is a game. One even decides the rules oneself! Indestructible, Immutable Self that commands! The dividing line between truth and falsehood is so blurred, all because they INSIST their falsehood is truth! The relations we share with people are true, but the terms that define them and limit them are not. If only everyone were CONNECTED and unperturbed by the vacillations of duality, not stumbling into the hackneyed habit of constantly making judgments, then JOY would be a natural state of our minds.

“Living in a world
that hardly knows you,
O Lord!
How could you expect
me to understand
Your smile
behind those rosy lips?
Elusive you remain,
ignoring these tearful eyes
and a hungering soul,
feeding so mercilessly
on my sorrow and loneliness.
Come and overwhelm me
with your love someday,
I am waiting,
what more can I say?”

“Your life springs from the obscurity of a hazy consciousness but proceeds to find an answer that could be one more step forward, however small or however big for civilization. Suddenly a realization dawns so unobtrusively that The Path itself is the goal and it goes on and on. Our quest for knowledge, our quest for wealth, our quest for love and our quest for liberation, all converge at a wonderful crossroad and open up to a highway, where they travel at a much higher speed.”

“Drops of water
separating from the ocean
they are pained.
Enchanted in a cloud
and missing the sea
they are disillusioned.
Falling from the sky
and merging with the waves
they are enlightened.
We only stand
on the shores
and watch...
feeling the tides
between our toes.”

(.*_*.)

** This poem was written sometime in 1993-94. On December 26, 2004 we played on the Marina beach in Chennai. The next day a killer tsunami struck, claiming more than 100,000 lives. We stood on that very shore, feeling the tide between our toes... I remember feeling sad for no apparent reason.
1. G. S. Road, Guwahati – Shillong Road, India. Barapani Lake is a scenic spot on this highway.