ShivAllahSita sutra 82

the canebrakes

nestled in the riverbank's lap

their clusters broken

from the weight of blue bees,

have in time

become stumps.

 

~Gathasaptasati 5:22

 

 

Located on the river Krishna, Nagarjunakonda was the greatest centre

of Buddhist learning, south of the Vindhyas, about 17 centuries ago.

Earlier known as Vijayapuri, Nagarjunakonda was the venue of many a

congregation of monks and scholars. The great Buddhist scholar

Nagarjuna, is said to have founded the University here.

 

Nagarjuna Konda was, once a splendid city with stupas, chaityas,

monasteries, and marvellous sculpture adorning them. It had a large

amphitheatre with perfect acoustics, an altar for the sacrifice of

horses, royal baths, quays and bathing ghats along the river, and a

well planned drainage system. With the passage of time and the

eclipse of Buddhism in India, the city found its way to the abandoned

lot, and had almost faded into oblivion.

In the fifties, excavations were resumed with added urgency, for the

ambitious Nagarjunasagar Hydro Electric Project, that was coming up

on the River Krishna. As work started for the project, the ruins from

the site, were relocated brick by brick, on the crest of a hill

overlooking the river. With the completion of the project,

Nagarjunakonda took on a new lease of life on the slopes of the

Nagarjuna hill, now an island in the immense lake.

Upstream the Krishna river is Nagarjunakonda, associated with the

famous Buddhist scholar of 2nd century, Nagarjuna. It was an

important Buddhist monastic institution, and has stupas with handsome

sculptures, depicting scenes from the life of Buddha. Indian

archaeologists have salvaged the precious ruins from their ancient

setting, lifting them atop a hill, and showcasing them in a museum,

styled as a vihara.

 

In this stone relief from Nagarjunakonda various episodes from the

Buddha's life, mithunas, are shown in between the pilasters

separating two different scenes.

The nayaka-nayika-bhava, the relationship between lovers and their

beloveds is beautifully depicted here. A refreshing aspect of the

Nagarjunakonda figures is their down-to-earth portrayal without any

pretensions to sophisticated standards of beauty.

These mithunas are in various charming attitudes of sambhoga

sringara, i.e. love in union, which have their poetic equivalent in

Hala Satavahana's Gathasaptasati of the same period. Here, a charming

interrelationship between poetry and sculpture is evident from the

following verses about the mithunas in a clockwise direction.

 

Always wanted to be your girl

And did not know how, teach me. 948

 

As he sprang forward

To embrace her

Her discreet pride

Retreated. 934

 

His form in my eyes

His touch in my limbs

His words in my ears

His heart in my heart

Now who is spared. 132

 

Lower garment misplaced

The gentle woman

Covered her thighs,

In her husband's embrace. 459

 

For our quarrels

Let us appoint another night

[Do not let] The bright one slip by. 466

 

~'The Absent Traveller', verses from the Gathasaptasati of Hala,

selected and translated by A.K. Mehrotra

 

~Prabhakar Begde

 

 

Bushy-tailed and bold at Trader Joe's,

Loading up on Reed's Ginger Beer by the six, it went like this -

"How's tricks?" asked my Ix, and i just said "Nay."

I found a way to play it my way by playing it as it lays.

It looked like I'd laid up enough brew for all summer,

all the whole way through.

But that was just a ruse to see if you would, if i could,

if this would or should,

If anything would make a difference...

lots of ginger ale or less, as a taste test.

Sucking it all down in a duo of days or letting it age

by opening a page

In a book that I mistook for wisdom & freedom when it was just

another volume of me,

Bound, spiraled round and stamped with an image of Bozo the Clown,

Reflected in a mirror and that mirror was magnified

by my identification And attachment to outcomes and longed for

realities which I would somehow

Manipulate, could somehow manipulate to my liking and sense

of security and safety.

Soda pop by the shelf-full and someone still seeks

to sell salt to the sea.

I sort of saw this one coming when I went running for cover

when rain In the name of me making something out of nothing

began to wash away my face -

The image of someone so secure and so soundly heard

that even the birds hurried

To do my bidding by singing a song so sweetly,

i was emboldened to say,

"Hey! Ginger brew or woks with marks, television or televangelism,

I tell you true,

You and I, we are Two-Not-Two, but Baby, here's the new rule –

In the macro of the biology of being versed in rice and koans,

I've concluded

That what's alluded to as Mystery

is merely me making silence with a spoon.

Not any spoon, but a spoon carved from a branch,

a broken-off twiglett

Carried through time and space as an ingot of gold,

borne aloft in the breeze

Of eternity, unbearably weightless and bearing the marks

of the teeth of Hotei,

The very teeth that Roshi of the Suzuki kind kept

as his last remnant of ego,

Etched by the Hand of OneHeart

held apart for a mere split in timelessness,

Timed to be reaffirmed and refined in this moment of remembering

the why

and the who of Who Am I,

ever-greening up the very Bo tree that Buddha sat under.

This Heart, this Inquiry, this Surrender,

It Is Buddha under the Bodhi tree, nay?"

Ixnay said it best, about the tests -

 

Beloved, I have wandered

deep and far in this landscape of myself.

I have waded out into the ocean of forgetfulness,

swallowed up at last in that sea of mystery,

and now I am washed ashore on the waves of your indulgence,

singing my little songs of remembrance.

Perhaps at night one of these tiny tunes may insinuate itself

into some neglected pocket of your wonder, and you will awaken

with a particular tear upon your cheek.

In that tear is everything I have come here for,

everything I am.

Everything is seeking. Always.

>From the shore, can you stop the boat out on the sea?

That which seeks is that for which it is seeking.

Beyond these words, persist.

Unless we can get to the marrow,

we will leave this table dissatisfied.

The tear is a kind gift from you to yourself.

Who will welcome this ….. sublimity?

 

Many believe that putting their head into the lion's mouth

is somehow some kind of metaphor?

We have no choice here. Really!

We can't go forward. We can't go back.

Now, having pushed out from the safe shore of certainty

into the current of vivid life,

whichever way we turn,

we are confronted with the lies of what we know,

and the truth of what we don't.

For far too long we have left the book of our deepest yearning

to gather dust in the secret library of the heart.

Now that we have opened its cover, we find that

there is something love wants to do with us.

Who is willing to listen to Her soft whisper, so familiar, like

the evening chimes in some abandoned ruin of a temple,

the temple of our longing?

Can you hear Her now? Her tears,

Her calling?

The ever-present music just behind our thoughts

caresses these tears that have appeared upon our cheek,

but all we seem to want is to just go back to sleep.

All around us the unsettled snores of wry forgetfulness

rise in the cacophonous chaos of dreamy limbo.

You, who now open bright eyes in the midst of

this dream:

stay here with me for awhile, and

let your cares drop off like the rags they are.

In our nakedness, we can point like little children

at the beauty of this incomprehensible sunlight pouring through

our windows, weaving together the shadows and the light that

become our innocent imaginary stories --

these simple little tales of lost and found,

forgetting and remembering.

We can whisper all the questions the water asks the sea, and

listen for the answers sung in seashells, tides, and foam.

Songs love to be sung. Can you be the song

your soul wants to sing?

I am here to sing it with you.

Our yearning is not different.

We can remember our original voice.

It is the voice that has never been bound. Never been limited.

Never despaired at the fragility of what transpires

from life to death.

Never faltered, though the most delicate beauty seems to fall and rot.

The closer things approach nothingness,

the more exquisite they become.

Your exquisiteness makes me weep,

and now my tears roll across our cheek.

There is a gleaming, glistening in our eyes that only magnifies

our tenderness.

This magnificent tenderness is still so unfamiliar

to those who entertain preferences.

To those who would be strong and storm heaven's gates.

To those who believe.

We can relinquish such fantasies,

because we have felt Her Lips pressed against the vulnerable tissues

of our heart, and not resisted.

This is all we need to know, that knowing at last submits itself

to that which open-armed embraces the unknown,

and rests there, at home, at peace.

Beloved, here it is.

Here it always Is.

I love you!

Having taken that final step off

the cliff of myself

I knew not what to expect,

nor did it matter falling, floating

wingspread wide and swooning

in the LightHeart of transparent Being.

 

So much I am moved to sing, this song

I sing of Breath to Name --

Heart to beating Heart.

We are not less than

Everything, nor are we more than

Nothing!

Perhaps you are nodding now?

Have we ever been other than This?

 

I cannot find where you leave off and

I begin.I do not know

who speaks, who listens.

 

Was it always so?

 

Or have I always been alone,

drinking this water of solitude

within the sea of my own body?

This body that is our Body,

our watery life?

 

Are my tears this water I recycle,

perpetually? Heart pumping soul

through sockets of light?

Soul drenched in spirit water,

baptized in my own essence?

 

But when I look within,

there is no within!

 

MMMMMMM!!!!!

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!

 

Oh, do you know this?

Of course you understand!

When I look at these words my tongue stops.

 

Who says what?

 

Where was that cliff I stumbled off?

Are you there now,

perhaps?

Perhaps peering out into

this boundlessness,

the space between these

tender mysterious thoughts?

 

Who is willing to give up what is most

closely held -

this throbbing pulsing life?

This breath?

This hope?

This word?

 

What is the mysterious

impulse, the anciently encoded

memory that sweeps us to

this edge of ourself, that

teeters us on the brink of

sweet oblivion?

 

Dare we stare down into its depths,

its bottomless voice echoing

back up to us in

Nada Brahma syllables?

In heart-piercing slices of

long-forgotten ecstasies,

now exploding once again within the

limitless space of un-owned

silent illumination?

 

Oh what can be said now, here

in the fire of the luscious

bright flame welling up from toes to

tip of crown and on and on and on forever?

 

Oh Grace That brings us here!

 

Oh Grace That flings us into That

from whence there is no exit!

 

Oh Grace that is our destiny,

when all else drops away at last

as you step off with me.

 

~Mazie & b

 

 

The other day I was invited for a get-together at a friend's house.

No sooner had the post-dinner singing started, my friend's 2-year old

daughter, Pavani, left all her toys, and began spontaneously dancing

to the rhythm of this song. She was so completely absorbed - the

delight on her face was heavenly. In that joyous state, I felt a

thrill of this little goddess' angelic blessing enveloping me. That's

dance in a nutshell!

Dance is not just about technique or style; the clothes, the

training, the discipline and tutelage, only take you that far. In the

final analysis, dance is all about us, at last, meeting and

connecting with our jubilant self. Whether it is in Rumi's whirling

tradition, Kabir's flight into the infinite, Ramana Maharishi's

innocent smiling shambhavi mudra, or Ramakrishna's ecstatic trance -

the essence of dance indeed comes alive for all of us to experience

in no uncertain terms. The above picture of the Great Swan

(Paramahamsa) vividly reveals this pulsating rhythm of creation

called dance - what my words can never describe. Imagine his

experience! It brings tears to my eyes and somewhere within me, my

spirit thirsts for this joy like nothing else. I feel the oozing,

uncontrollable bliss of the serpentine dance unfold inside me to the

drum beat of the Anahat Naad, as I feel Kabir gently holding me and

singing:

 

The Swan Will Fly Away All Alone,

Spectacle of the World Will Be a Mere Fair

As the Leaf Falls from the Tree

Is Difficult to Find

Who Knows Where it Will Fall

Once it is Struck with a Gust Of Wind

When Life Span is Complete

Then Listening to Orders, Following Others, Will Be Over

The Messengers of Yama are Very Strong

It's an Entanglement with the Yama

Servant Kabir Praises the Attributes of the Lord

He Finds the Lord Soon

Guru Will Go According to His Doings

The Disciple According to His

 

The eagle of death lands only to find that the swan has flown away,

dancing to the eternal tune of the infinite. A solo dance that nobody

saw, nobody heard; No teaching, no learning, no stage, no seating, no

performer, no audience, no theme, no story, no composition, no start,

no intermission, no finish, no music, no accompaniments, and no signs

of a performance either. Those who know still grasp it, soaring and

rejoicing with this dance of life!

 

~Maalok

March 4, 2001

 

 

Even though

 

There is no bull

 

And no I,

 

Aim unerring

 

Pierces the center

 

Of the center

 

And the inner ring

 

Is heard...

 

 

The real battle is for memory-space.

The individual who is 'cultivated', becomes aware of persistent

figures inhabiting memory, and learns to flush the memory-caches

voluntarily, at will.

The cultivated individual is thus in a minority, statistically. Such

individuals shun mass movements and mass religions, but unless there

is constant vigilance, the _tendency_ to populate memory with

persistent images (which cast solid shadows) will still dominate.

Thus, we have 'alternative' religions or quasi- religions, which

utilize persistent objects of memory, in the exact mode as do

populist and proprietary movements. It seems that Advaita is becoming

one of those.

The most difficult life to live, is one in which objects are not

allowed to accumulate and remain in memory. This lifestyle is called

nonattachment', and is as rare as a commune of hermits.

We have the lineage of methodologists whose goals are nothing less

than the complete emptying of memory-space. Chief among these

methodologists is the disciple of Buddha named Nagarjuna.

Nagarjuna perfected a method of emptiness which has never been, to my

knowledge, surpassed.

Nagarjuna knew with certainty, that if a teaching is considered to

be 'contents' of mind, that the result would not persist, due to the

vying for memory-space between various teachers, and religious power-

blocks. The mind that is fully inhabited by persistent and successful

projectors of solid shadows, is not a free mind.

Nagarjuna, as a disciple of Buddha, designed a method of teaching

which is embedded in the dialectic of the teachings themselves. The

ideas and words of the teachings, are designed to gradually abolish

the contents of the mind, leaving the mind free for the use of the

owner of the mind. Thus the dialectic of emptiness, considered one of

the most challenging of teachings, but one which abolishes the idea

of "attainment by sustaining of solid illusions".

After reading all of this, if you have followed my attempt to convey

a certain understanding, you will see the usefulness of an empty

bucket.

The empty bucket is ready for use.

The goal is not to have an empty mind, but instead, a mind that can

emptied.

A mind that is clogged by 'tradition' is less useful than one which

is empty and ready for use by the owner. Such a mind is

called 'free', as in, unencumbered.

 

==Gene Poole==

 

If less is more, nothing is everything.

 

 

For many, Nagarjuna is considered second only to Buddha in

importance and depth of insight.

 

At the core of Naagaarjuna's key writings -- the Muula-

madhyamaka-kaarikaa (MMK) (Verses on the Fundamental Middle Way) and

Vigraha-vyavaartanii (VV) (Refutation of Objections) -- lay a

devastating methodological attack on the coherency of some of the

most cherished and ingrained Indian beliefs, views, presuppositions,

and theories. Naagaarjuna's critique challenged Buddhist and non-

Buddhist alike. While he extols the Buddha and the doctrine of

pratiitya-samutpaada (conditioned co-arising), his assault on the

underlying assumptions entailed in notions of selfhood and causality

deliberately undermined the conventional as well as the more

sophisticated ideas held by Buddhists concerning Buddha and pratiitya-

samutpaada.

He deployed a tetralemmic logic already adopted by Buddha

in the early Paali texts (such as in the Brahmajaala-sutta, Diigha-

Nikaaya I). In the Paali tradition, the use of the Tetralemma is

initially attributed to Sa~njaya, a skeptical teacher whose students

challenged Buddha early in Buddha's teaching career. Two of

Sa~njaya's students, Upatissa and Kolita, were won over, and went on

to become two of Buddha's most important disciples, better known in

the Buddhist tradition by the names Sariputta and Moggallana. It is

possible that it was they who introduced the tetralemmic method to

Buddhism.

Just as Buddha described his Middle Way as a renunciation

of extremes, such as eternalism and annihilationalism, or pleasure

and pain, etc. (see below), employing the Tetralemma to expose the

fallacies of such extremisms, Naagaarjuna also deployed the

Tetralemma along with other logical and rhetorical strategies in

order to expose and negate all manner of extremist thinking, down to

the most presuppositional level. His critique was so devastating that

few in the history of Indian thought ever confronted it head on. Non-

Buddhists, such as the Nyaaya (Hindu logic school), avoided the

thrust of his arguments by branding him a nihilist (naastika), and

thus dismissing him; thereby allowing themselves to comfortably

ignore him. The nihilist label, though a gross mischaracterization

and misunderstanding of Naagaarjuna's philosophy, has persisted and

even recurs from time to time in modern scholarship on Madhyamaka.

 

The most important--and most misunderstood--term used by

Naagaarjuna is "emptiness" (`suunyataa). It does not mean a cosmic

void, nonexistence, a substratum nihilum, or a denial of the world(s)

of common experience. Nor does it signify a mystical via negativa.

Rather it signifies the absence of something very precise: svabhaava,

or self-essence. "Self-essence" is a technical Indian philosophical

term denoting anything that creates itself (sui generis), is

independent, immutable, possessing an invariant essence, self-

defining, etc. Usually Hindus envision self-essential things as

eternal also. The two most important self-essential things in Hindu

thought are God and the Self (or soul).

According to standard Buddhist doctrine the subtlest,

deepest, and most dangerous false view held by humans is the belief

in a permanent, independent self. Our sense of "self" derives

from "misreading" the causes and conditions of experience. Afraid of

death and the possibility of our personal nonexistence, we

desperately impute and cling to permanence where there is none,

imagining that something permanent subtends the flux of experiential

conditions. Rather than recognize causes and conditions for what they

are, we hypostatize their obvious effects, often deeming these

hypostatized "entities" to be more real than what we encounter in

actual experience. Thus the notion of "self" is symptomatic of our

deepest desires and fears. Overcoming that view by seeing that all

that comes into existence does so dependent on perpetually changing

causes and conditions (pratiitya-samutpaada) is to "see things as

they truly become" (yathaa-bhuutam).

Buddha had spoken often of a "middle way" between extreme

views. The two extremes he discussed most often were "eternalism"

and "annihilationalism," or put in other terms, "continuity"

and "discontinuity." Things (e.g., the world, persons, etc.) were

neither continuous nor discontinuous. Neither the world nor the

things in it endure unchanging and endlessly; nor is the world a

random, discontinuous, fragmented happenstance. Things are neither

reducible entirely to their specific causative conditions, nor are

they ever something other than their conditions: this is the middle

way.

Naagaarjuna understood the basic message of Buddha to be

the elimination of all hypostatic theoretizations, i.e., abstractions

which had been concretized to the point of seeming more real than the

conditions from which they had been abstracted. Such views he called

d.r.s.ti. For Naagaarjuna, however, the problem of hypostatization

was not confined to the notion of self in its limited sense of an

individual's self-essence, but was apparent everywhere, since all

seemingly rational explanations of the way things are--including the

Buddhist explanations of his day--were grounded in conceptual

entities that were ultimately unreal (e.g., self, God, nirvana,

etc.). All our fundamental notions, including time, actions (karma)

and the agents of action, the characteristics with which things are

defined and classified, relations, and so on, all were infiltrated by

d.r.s.ti. Naagaarjuna recognized that at bottom d.r.s.ti hinged on

the notions of "identity" and "difference." Identity was simply

another name for self-essence (svabhaava): a continuous, invariant,

self-identical essence. Difference presupposed the very notion of

identity that it attempted to negate, since to claim 'X is different

from Y' presupposes that X and Y have determinate identities; and if

taken seriously such that difference marks the complete absence of

all identities, difference would entail such radical discontinuity,

disjunction, and lack of intelligibility that even the most mundane

things would become incoherent and inexplicable. In his major work,

the Muula-madhyamaka-kaarikaa, he constructed a methodology for

ferreting out d.r.s.ti such that the middle way between identity and

difference might be realized. "Empty" signifies what occurs through

causes and conditions and is therefore devoid of self-essence.

Everything, when seen properly, is devoid of self-essence, and

thus "empty." It is the self-essence which is unreal, not the flux of

conditions (though Naagaarjuna also warns against

hypostatizing "conditions").

 

~Dan Lusthaus

 

 

 

Dance is the earliest language of the human race. In the primitive

ages, when there were no languages, ancient man used gestures to

communicate. Even after the languages came into existence man still

used gestures along with language to express himself effectively.

Dance is nothing but the expression of the mind through body

movements. Dance in Indian culture is believed to be a manifestation

of Divinity. According to the Natya Shastra, Brahma the Supreme

Creator took the recitation from the Rig Veda, the song from the Sama

Veda, the Abhinayas from the Yajur Veda and created the fifth Veda

the Natya Veda.

 

The Hindu Pantheon is replete with Gods and Goddesses using the

medium of dance to express their feelings and emotions. Done the

gages Dance has always symbolized the best and the noblest aspect of

India's rich and glorious cultural heritage.

 

Odissi dance is considered one of the oldest based on archeological

evidence. The present day Odissi is however a culmination of ;a

process of reconstruction from various dance traditions of Orissa

like the Maharis, the Goptuas and the Bhandanrutya traditions.

Maharis are equivalent to the Devadasis of the South. Goptuas are

basically men who dressed themselves like female dancers and danced

like the Maharis. Jayadeva's Gitagovinda has enriched the content and

style of this form of dance.

 

A typical Odissi dance begins with Mangalacharan. Here the danseuse

prays to Mother Earth seeking her forgiveness for stepping on her, as

was well as her blessings. Next the danseuse pays obeisance to the

Lord and then seeks the blessings of the audience. Finally she

invokes her Guru.

 

The next stage is the Batu nrutya where the danseuse pays a tribute

to Natraja, the Lord of Dance.

 

Pallavi, which means a new leaf, follows. It is the most graceful

part of Odissi with soft, rhythmic movements set to various ragas.

 

If Pallavi epitomizes grace than Abhinaya symbolizes eloquence of

expressions. The love stories of Radha and Krishna, Shiva and Parvati

are enacted with facial expressions and gestures serving as the media

of communication.

 

Moksha is the culmination, with the danseuse depicting the search for

Nirvana.

 

Odissi is not merely a dance form. It is a synthesis of beauty,

grace, rhythm, melody, spirituality and devotion. It provides a feast

for the eyes, music for the ears and succor for the soul. Through

this dance, the danseuse pays obeisance to the Lord in all his myriad

manifestations. In essence this unique dance form is a tribute to

divinity.

 

~ Ramendra Kumar

 

 

Some of the first human beings in whom the new consciousness emerged

fully became the great teachers of humanity, such as Buddha, Lao

Tzu, or Jesus, although their teachings were greatly misunderstood,

especially when they turned into organized religion. They were the

first manifestations of the flowering of human consciousness. Later

others appeared, some of whom became famous and respected teachers,

whereas others probably remained relatively unknown or perhaps even

completely unrecognized. On the periphery of the established

religions, from time to time certain movements appeared through

which the new consciousness manifested. This enabled a number of

individuals within those movements to awaken spiritually. Such

movements, in Christianity, were Gnosticism and medieval mysticism;

in Buddhism, Zen; in Islam, the Sufi movement; in Hinduism, the

teachings called Advaita Vedanta.

 

But those men and women who awakened fully were always few and far

between – rare flowerings of consciousness. Until fairly recently,

there was not yet a need for large numbers of human beings to

awaken. For the first time in human history, a large-scale

transformation of consciousness has now become a necessity if

humanity is to survive. Science and technology have amplified the

effects of the dysfunction of the human mind in its unawakened state

to such a degree that humanity, and probably the planet, would not

survive for another hundred years if human consciousness remains

unchanged. As I said earlier, evolution usually occurs in response

to a crisis situation, and we now are faced with such a crisis

situation. This is why there is indeed an enormous acceleration in

the awakening process of our species.

 

~Tolle

 

 

I am a seeker

A bird soaring high in the sky!

In that moment of flying

A blissful state in the air

Where you are free-full of space

A vast expanse of azure blue sky

I move my hands with gestures

Like Pataka,Mudrakhya,Kataka

Oh ! is there a Mushti of strength

To break away from the dwarfed Kartarimukha ?

Yes of course, for I am a Shukatunda

Not just a winged being that can fly

But a lark as well that can sing

Plaintive notes so sweet and melodious.

My hands extend like wings

My fingers formulating the

Hastas-Kapitha, Hamsapaksha,Shikhara

My feet in samapada moves softly and gently

Like a snow-white swan moving in calm waters.

With Hamsasya it is the beauty of the body

Fulfilling the yearning of the self

With Anjali-the palms joined together

It is the expression of the devotion for the infinite

With Ardhachandra-the half moon

It is the trinity moving in three directions

Undulating and swaying in life's vicissitudes.

Mukura and Bhramara are the bees that buzz

Around the honey filled blossoms and

The peacock that proudly parades its hues

Is that Suchimukha pointing a forefinger

At what you are or who?

Pallava and Tripataka cautions you

To limit your desires.

Mrigashirsha is the four legged animal

That stands firmly on the ground

With two horns to protect itself from the unpredictable.

Slimy and poisonous is the Sarpashirsha

Yet a friend of Shiva curled around his neck

Like a jewel in the crown.

Vardhamanaka is the ultimate seeker

Of moksha- the ultimate salvation

Removing the selfish motives is Arala

And finally we hold the Urnanabha

The eternal dish of contentment and

Encompassing the eternal values in its

Katakamukha hasta – safe and secure

With Alapadma it is the expression of joy

Or Ananda- the fathomless bliss

That all dancers strive for

Let me dance, dance and dance

Like the bird that flies

In the boundless skies

Higher and higher – farther and farther

Into the wide blue horizon.

 

~Geeta Radhakrishna

March 8, 2001 - The hastamudras mentioned in the poem

are taken from Hastalakshanadeepika

 

 

You cannot quit me so quickly

There's no hope in you for me

No corner you could squeeze me

But I got all the time for you, love

 

The Space Between

The tears we cry

Is the laughter keeps us coming back for more

The Space Between

The wicked lies we tell

And hope to keep safe from the pain

 

But will I hold you again?

These fickle, fuddled words confuse me

Like 'Will it rain today?'

Waste the hours with talking, talking

These twisted games we're playing

 

We're strange allies

With warring hearts

What wild-eyed beast you be

The Space Between

The wicked lies we tell

And hope to keep safe from the pain

 

Will I hold you again?

Will I hold...

 

Look at us spinning out in

The madness of a roller coaster

You know you went off like a devil

In a church in the middle of a crowded room

All we can do, my love

Is hope we don't take this ship down

 

The Space Between

Where you're smiling high

Is where you'll find me if I get to go

The Space Between

The bullets in our firefight

Is where I'll be hiding, waiting for you

The rain that falls

Splash in your heart

Ran like sadness down the window into...

The Space Between

Our wicked lies

Is where we hope to keep safe from pain

 

Take my hand

'Cause we're walking out of here

Oh, right out of here

Love is all we need here

 

The Space Between

What's wrong and right

Is where you'll find me hiding, waiting for you

The Space Between

Your heart and mine

Is the space we'll fill with time

The Space Between...

 

~Dave Matthews Band

 

 

What ever the inquiry, when the inquirer vanishes,

everything goes.

 

~Harsha

 

 

`If the process of manifestation, which involves the

full-fledged appearance of the visible world, never truly

involves a departure from the unmanifest, undifferentiated

reality of Shiva, then it follows that the tantric path of

return consists of the recovery of this vision of the

undifferentiated unity of all things. This vision, which at

first appears to annihilate all things into the dark abyss of

Shiva, later grows into the unmilana samadhi, which reveals

the pulsating essence of Shiva actively structuring and

maintaining all the apparently finite and even inert forms of

visible reality. The yogin must come to a vision of the

inseparability of all things from Shiva.'"

 

~Abhinavagupta

 

 

Dance (It's Raining)

 

Sprinkling instants

Warm and cold.

Generous time.

A knot of clour

Unraveled by light.

A mixture of rhythm

Without an echo:

It's raining.

 

~Diana Mateescu (11 years, Romania, 1972)

 

 

229.

 

When the yearning can no longer invest itself in anything

less than truth a seed mysteriously begins to sprout.

As the seed is nurtured through the release of

all constructs of resistance to truth, truth

breaks ground with a diamond-pointed

stem, piercing the heart as it blooms

into the sky, raining petals of

vanishing light into light,

magnifying itself

to itself.

 

 

~Mazie & b

 

 

Rain is like a dropping pearl,

Like a music box.

Raindrops sound

Like an orchestra

To which frogs add

Their happy chants.

An invisible perfume rises

>From the wet land and the peculiar

Smell of the trees

Surrounds…

 

~Carlos Alberto Rodriguez ( 9 years, Argentina, 1972)

 

243.

 

 

We are born and then we die –

how few wake out of time and space to

really taste what's in-between!

 

I have crossed the thin red line of

my own blood to be here, to break

upon a shock of flashing light

made flesh as this moment I am,

pouring light, streaming down to

lift the forms of light I am into a

dark brightness so vast, and yet so

particular in the precision of

its forming and informing one

singular beauty, a beauty

moment by moment refined in heart's

furnace, drawn by the magnet

of my own light, loving, lifted out of

lost or found, words and what they

don't say, can't say,

still saying,

over and over and over –

Yes! Yes! Yes!

 

This light is that kind of poison,

elegantly trickled into a dead man's

mouth, and as this dusty corpse

rises, yawns and exhales billowing

yellow marigold light, eyes become

rivers, drowning visions upon visions

within one fixed pupil, the other

shimmering bright with glory ray,

spiraling, swirling into dancing

desire, drunk deep of desire,

desire poised for imminent

immolation on the pyre of itself,

suddenly bursting into the hungry

flames of what it came here for,

a something somehow sliding into

itself, vastness impregnating

itself with its own light,

nothing more, not even

this.

 

~Mazie & b

 

 

LoveEternal.