The bridal night

The night is cloudy and still. A lone owl hoots in the distance. A sad melancholy sound. The trees are unstirring, the birds asleep. But in the sky a spectacle unfolds. The clouds move across the sky in a slow, dreamy motion. Soft, pale and wispy, they are lit up with a gentle glow. Suddenly, the clouds part and the deep black sky appears. Stars twinkle one by one. And then she emerges, the ethereal bride, half her face in shadows, the other half blushing a soft shade of red. And just as quickly the clouds hasten to cover her face, as if afraid of the evil eye.

But I am patient, I stand in the cold night air, wrapped in a blanket, looking up at the sky. The clouds have taken on a pink glow and glide across the sky like a bridal procession. Then they grant me one more glimpse. The dark sky reappears, more stars twinkle and the bride reveals her face again. The shadows are deeper and the blush has brightened. She laughs at me and I laugh back at her. The blushing bride in a dreamy sky. On the night of the total lunar eclipse. A celestial hide-n-seek. A surreal, moving, memorable experience.

I dwell in Possibility

I dwell in Possibility
A fairer House than Prose.
More numerous of Windows
Superior--for Doors.

Of Chambers as the Cedars
Impregnable of Eye.
And for an Everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky.

Of Visitors--the fairest,
For Occupation--This,
The spreading wide my narrow
Hands To gather Paradise.
- Emily Dickinson

If only I could

If I could have your shoulder again,
I would soak it with my tears.
If I could have your lap again,
There I would lay my fears.

If I could hear your voice again,
I would stop still and listen.
If I could see your smile again,
With joy my world would glisten.

My love of music I got from you,
My passion for books was yours too.
Your gentleness lives on in my heart,
Nature and beauty a lovely part.

The trees you planted grow tall and strong,
The house you built weathers on and on.
Your presence I sense in the fragrant scene,
When you left, you became one with me.

Eulogy

Your hand on my head is gentle still,
Your kiss on my forehead tender,
Heartfelt are your blessings still,
Your love as always overfull.

Why would I weep and moan and groan,
And rend my clothes asunder?
From this useless shell, empty and worn,
Oh gentle spirit, long have you flown.

Death may have pulled a trick on us.
And torn this bond asunder,
But how can there be a goodbye
When I hold you deep inside?

My place of worship

I have a litle forest in my backyard, tall trees grow close together along with ferns and bamboo and flowering bushes and the ground is carpeted with brown, rotting leaves. On sunny days, sunlight slants in and lights up the spaces in between. Leaves rustle in the still air and sometimes birds call in lilting cadences. This is my place of worship. The trees standing tall are the columns of the temple and the bushes are the altars. The birds are the unrehearsed choir and the camelias are the offerings. Here my soul bows to a gentle presence, here my soul sings His rhapsody, here I touch His soft-footed feet, here I find my God.

Twenty Special Secrets

1. When two people meet, the prize always goes to the one with the most self-insight. He will be calmer, more confident, more at ease with the other.

2. Never permit the behavior of other people to tell you how to feel.

3. Pay little attention to what people say or do. Instead, try to see their innermost motive for speaking and acting. (Now, apply this very same rule to yourself and you become an enlightened person!)

4. Any friendship requiring the submission of your original nature and dignity to another person is all wrong.

5. Mystically speaking, there is no difference between you and another person. This is why we cannot hurt another without hurting ourselves, nor help another without helping ourselves.

6. When we are free of all unnecessary desires toward other people, we can never be deceived or hurt.

7. You take a giant step toward psychological maturity when you refuse to angrily defend yourself against unjust slander. For one thing, resistance disturbs your own peace of mind.

8. You understand others to the exact degree that you really understand yourself. Work for more self-knowledge.

9. Do not be afraid to fully experience everything that happens to you in your human relations, especially the pains and disappointments. Do this and everything becomes clear at last.

10. The individual who really knows what it means to love has no anxiety when his love is unseen or rejected.

11. If you painfully lose a valuable friend, do not rush out for a replacement. Such action prevents you from examining your heartache and breaking free of it.

12. Do not be afraid to be a nobody in the social world. This is a deeper and richer truth than appears on the surface.

13. Every unpleasant experience with another person is an opportunity to see people as they are, not as we mistakenly idealize them. The more unpleasant the other person is, the more he can teach you.

14. You can be so wonderfully free from a sense of injury and injustice that you are surprised when you hear others complain of them.

15. We cannot recognize a virtue in another person that we do not possess in ourselves. It takes a truly loving and patient person to recognize those virtues in another.

16. Do not mistake desire for love. Desire leaves home in a frantic search for one gratification after another. Love is at home with itself.

17. There are parts of you that want the loving life and parts that do not. Place yourself on the side of your positive forces; do all you can to aid and encourage them.

18. You must stop living so timidly, from fixed fears of what others will think of you and of what you will think of them.

19. Do not contrive to be a loving person; work to be a real person. Being real is being loving.

20. The greatest love you could ever offer to another is to so transform your inner life that others are attracted to your genuine example of goodness.

- Vernon Howard

Father

One night a father overheard his son pray:
"Dear God, Make me the kind of man my Daddy is."
Later that night, the Father prayed,
"Dear God, Make me the kind of man my son wants me to be."

-- Unknown

The Imposter

Laugh not your lifeless laugh,
Shake not your fleshless bones.
You have stalked us through life,
Through every living moment.
Relentless, you have followed us
Through our nights and our days.
You have cast your shadow on our sleep,
And eaten with us at our table.

But now your stealthy steps bring no dread,
Your deathly pallor frightens me no more.
For I have pulled aside your dark mask,
Unafraid, I have looked you in your face,
I have parted the veil and exposed your lie.
For all I can see is life everlasting,
A journey endless, a peace eternal.
Proud death, you are but an imposter.
---------------------------------------------

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting. - Wordsworth

--------------------------------------------------------

Writing

Writing is essentially a solitary activity. When a writer writes he enters the dark cave of his mind, where no one else can enter, sets fire to his soul, fuels it with his joy and his pain and everything else in between and hopes that the ensuing light will pour into his pen and transform itself into words. After he has done with putting it down, he has finished his work, he has answered his calling. A writer who seeks fame and recognition is a peddlar of his soul.

Haiku

The ashes of my dreams
I have poured into my pen,
Look, how the poems blossom !

A place called home

There is a place called home
Where my spirit moves among the trees
And rises as sap into the leaves
And rustles as the wind beneath birds’ wings.


There is a place called home
Where yellow wildflowers sprinkle the grass
And always amaze me with their love for life
And fairies dance beneath the toadstools.

There is a place called home
Where my spirit sings to the drumbeat of rain
On the roof, and stands in awe to the moan
Of the wind wailing against the walls.

There is a place called home
Where my spirit soars to the twinkling stars
In a cloudless sky and trips across the Milky Way
And the moon rises laughing behind the hills.

There is a place called home
Where my spirit rests in the hollow of the valley
Nestling among verdant hills lit up with the laughter
Of a hundred, babbling, sparkling brooks.

The crumbling conversation

I stand before your door, dear friend,
Desolate, begging, bowl in hand,
Asking a crumb, a stitch, a caring hand,
This broken heart with which to mend.

But talk you would of the weather vane,
The howling wind, the thundering rain,
While my heart lashed with stormy pain,
Seeks a solitary, soothing word in vain.

Of war and peace you talk of next,
Of orphans, widows, of seething unrest,
While peace has fled my ravaged heart,
And sleep is but a fleeting guest.

Surely India cannot be left behind,
The wealth, the growth, the prospering land,
My hunger meanwhile gnaws and growls, and
The bowl grows heavy in my hand.

Where are those radiant, open lines of trust?
Those shining pathways to your heart,
How well you play a stranger’s part,
While the bowl sadly crumbles into dust.

The serene air

The day dawns misty and rainy, the hills outside our window fade in and out of the mist like specters. The rain is a fine spray on the windshield. As the train runs past the sea the hills in the distance are completely obscured by the mist and the bay looks like an open sea, vast and endless. There is no colour visible except varying shades of grey from white to a shiny, steely blue, and Mt.Victoria rises in the distance like a ghost hill, mysteriously stripped of the dwellings clinging to its sides. In spite of the dark, brooding sky and the colourless landscape, I feel a serenity matched by the floating mist, the still air and the gentle presence of God in the wind gently caressing the steel sea.

Love or Sacrifice?

Being an Indian woman, years of conditioning have taught me to sacrifice. Sacrifice my needs, my wants, my desires, my dreams for the needs of others. But in my book sacrifice is a bad word. If you are giving up something for someone else it should be out of love, willingly, it should be an act of love, a giving, then it blesses you and the receiver too. But sacrifice implies that you are doing it out of obligation, it is forced out of you by conditioning, by a sense of duty, there is an element of force to it, albeit hidden. Or it is done out a hidden fear, as if you might lose something if you didn’t sacrifice..

So we have been taught to sacrifice, we are told the rewards are many, all to be reaped in the afterlife. And maybe there are rewards in this life too. For sacrificing allows a person to feel morally superior, self-righteous even, all the brownie points that you collect to be redeemed according to the Law of Karma. And often it is used as emotional blackmail, as in “I sacrificed my life for you and you can’t even do this little thing for me….”. It gives you leverage over others. But in the final analysis, in total honesty, if can you look deep into your heart, it is quite possible that you mind find anger and resentment, a touch of bitterness even, over all the things that you sacrificed, because you did it not out of love.

Therefore, above all, love yourself. Like Buddha said “You can look the whole world over and never find anyone more deserving of love than yourself”. Then you are brimming with love and it flows in all directions towards all things. Then there will be no need to sacrifice, because all your acts will be acts of love.

All things are possible

Today evening as the train goes by the sea, I can see the clouds sitting atop the hills, grey clouds with rosy plumes like exotic birds, and the water rippling silver with the faintest touch of pink. And the folds in the hills lit up by the reflected rays of the setting sun. And I ask God how he paints a masterpiece on the sky every evening. He says, "All things are possible with me, all things are possible with you too". Somehow it is very comforting to know that my life is in the hands of someone so loving, so creative and so encompassing.

You come to me, always

On gloriously alive mornings,
The golden light slanting.
You come to me, laughing
As playful sunbeams, tripping,
Dancing, kissing my face.

On bright, sunlit afternoons,
Walking towards the hills,
You come to me, smiling
A beauteous vision of wildflowers
Around a sudden bend.

In the hush of twilight,
As the night falls gently.
You come to me, joyous
On the velvet wings of birds
Coming home to roost.

In the still of the night
Shadows asleep ‘neath the trees.
You come to me, soft-footed
As silvery moonbeams, treading
Tiptoe across the grass.

In the warm embrace of sleep,
Mind still, heart at peace.
You come to me, singing
Sweet melodies of spirits
Mingling, merging, becoming one.

Like a dream come true……

A Return to Love

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate,
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous -
Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.
Your playing small doesn't serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people
Won't feel insecure around you.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone,
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously
Give other people permission to do the same.

- Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love

Trees

I think I shall never see
A poem as lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth’s flowing breast.

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray.

A tree that may in summer wear,
A nest of robins in her hair.

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

- Joyce Kilmer

Flower musings, pumpkin and lemon

It is Sunday morning and I am in the backyard. This part of our yard is secluded; it is cut off from neighbours’ eyes by fencing and from our house by thick clumps of trees, like my own piece of paradise. The cranberry bush is laden with fruit and I pluck them off and eat the sweet, juicy berries as a prequel to breakfast. The pumpkin vine in the vegetable patch gleams a tender green, the leaves with tiny translucent spikes, and a pumpkin in the early stages of infancy. There is also a single bloom, yellow and radiant, with a bell like base flaring into the delicate petal. I peep inside and to my wonder and surprise there is a bee inside, doing a kind of dance which I’m sure only the bees know the steps of. It is such a wondrous sight, nature in the process of symbiosis, giving and taking, wordlessly.


I walk past the clumps of trees, giving off a woody fragrance, exclusive to trees on early mornings or under damp, moist conditions and my heart rises in joy and gratitude like as if the trees had just sung a ghazal. Past the bird bath, the water turned rancid and brown, and the elegant ferns with fronds rising like fans fit for queens, till I reach the lemon tree. There are a few flowers and fewer fruit, nature is winding down for winter. Lemon flowers have this most delicately exquisite fragrance and when the tree is in full bloom, I just stand next to it and drink of the smell or when I am passing by, a whiff hits me and makes me pause and remember that the beauty in life lies in the tiny, imperceptible things that we so often unknowingly pass by.

Weekends, among other things …………

There is a practice here in the workplace that I found a bit odd in the beginning – asking about your weekend. I used to find it difficult to answer at first, but then I realized that it was just a means of starting a conversation. You are free to say anything you want, even invent something and often it leads to other discussions that can get quite interesting.

Then one day I said to a friend “why do you ask me what I did on the weekend, I might tell you all that I did but not what I experienced. I might not tell you that I stood on the balcony at night and watched the full moon rise over the trees and even the clouds that hung over the moon couldn’t dilute the magical quality of the light that filled the sky and lit up the hills, the trees, the grass, the house with a gentle, dreamy light. And in spite of the moonlight, the stars twinkled and the universe that stretched out into eternity, God’s benediction everywhere, His lovely smile everywhere.

Or that the petals of the rose that felt velvety to the touch, God’s love and his joy of creation in every fragrant whorl, as if God’s saying to me, ‘Let you every act be an act of love, my child. Let your every thought, every word create beauty, bring harmony, introduce joy’.”

Daybreak

Today morning I am catching the early morning train which is rather unusual but such a treat. The day is just breaking and patches of silvery sky are visible behind the clouds. The river gleams silver into the distance where it meets with the sea. The is a lone paddle boat in it, the rider gently paddling away like a ghost oarsman. As we come to the sea the scene is eerie, the hills are in shadows and water is a rippling sheet of silver, the light cast by the sunlight escaping from behind soft, cottony clouds has a mystical quality to it. There are a group of oarsmen rowing a canoe in perfect unison. Wellington gleams dully in the distance caught by stray patches of light, willing it to wake up.

Daybreak is a herald of new beginnings, like God has kept his promise and it is up to us to seize the opportunity. It brings hope and light into the darkness that has gone before and the light breaking out through the gaps in the clouds fills my heart with gladness and joy.

Surprising enough the train is full, Wellingtonians like to start early. But the sleep tugging at my eyelids reminds me that I am a nightbird still.

The Deep

I want to go,
to the middle of the sea,
and lie face down,
with my back to the sun,
looking into the depths.

At some point I will succumb
to those watery arms.
Body racked, with want of air,
until I start to inhale,
water filling up the lungs,
also the stomach,
bloating, exploding.

I don’t know when
my soul will leave the body.
Will it be sad?
Disappointed ? Glad ?
Will some animal dine on the shell?
Or will it be washed up
on some forgotten shore?

A thin line of reason
holds on to this life,
but the desire is long gone.

One heck of a lady

There are lots of things about Kiwis that are commendable but their die-hard spirit and independence often stand out.

My friend's 80 year old mother suffers from Leukemia (incurable) and her Dad (also 80) from Alzheimers, who sometimes has difficulty remembering who he is and who his wife is (who is the old lady with grey hair in the other room?). Both of them live by themselves and refuse to move into the children's homes. Her Mum drives herself and her husband around, does the shopping, housework, pays the bills etc. When her blood count drops, she requires transfusions and last month she had to be rushed to hospital with a clot in the leg.

So yesterday when my friend said to me that her Mum's going to Australia alone for two weeks, I was surprised. I asked "Why?"

"Oh ! She's got cousins. She has put Dad in a respite home so he'll be okay. She said she needed a break and wanted some time to herself".

All I could say was 'WOW !"

I know that different people will call it different things, but I call it 'nurturing yourself'.

Greed / Beyond Greed

-------- Excerpt from the book 'Osho Transformation' -------

GREED

Whenever people become very greedy, they become very hurried, and go on finding more ways to gain more speed. They are continuously on the run because they think that life is running out. These are people who say, “Time is money.” Time is money? Money is very limited, time is unlimited. Time is not money, time is eternity – it has always been there and will always be there. And you have always been here and you will always be here.

So drop greed, and don’t be bothered about the result. Sometimes it happens that because of your impatience, you miss many things.

BEYOND GREED

Man is full if he in tune with the universe. If he is not in tune with the universe then he is empty, utterly empty. And out of that emptiness comes greed. Greed is to fill it – with money, with furniture, with friends, with lovers, with anything – because one cannot live in emptiness. It is horrifying, it is a ghost life. If you are empty and there is nothing inside you, it is impossible to live.

To have this feeling that you have much inside you, there are only two ways: either you get in tune with the universe…… Then you are filled with the whole, with all the flowers and with all the stars. They are within you just as they are without you. That is real fulfillment. But if you don’t do that – and millions of people are not doing that – then the easier way is to fill it with any junk.

Greed simply means you are feeling a deep emptiness and you want to fill it with anything possible, it doesn’t matter what it is. And once you understand it, then you have nothing to do with greed. You have something to do with coming into communion with the whole, so the inner emptiness disappears. And with it, all greed disappears.

But there are mad people all over the world, and they are collecting things to fill their emptiness. Somebody is collecting money although he never uses it. People are eating; they are not feeling hungry and still they go on swallowing. They know that this is going to create suffering, they will be sick, but they cannot prevent themselves. This eating is also a filling-up process. So there can be many ways to fill emptiness, although it is never full - it remains empty, and you remain miserable because it is never enough. More is needed, and the more and the demand for more is unending.

You have to understand the emptiness that you are trying to fill, and ask the question, “Why am I empty? The whole existence is so full, why am I empty? Perhaps I have lost track – I am no longer moving in the same direction, I am no longer existential. That is the cause of my emptiness.”

So be existential.

Let go, and move closer to existence in silence and peace, in meditation.

And one day you will see you are so full – overfull, overflowing – of joy, of blissfulness, of benediction. You have so much of it that you can give it to the whole world and yet it will not be exhausted.

That day, for the first time you will not feel any greed – for money, for food, for things, for anything. You will live naturally, and whatever is needed you will find it.

Dilemma

The decision hovers over us like a knife,
waiting for a move, waiting to strike,
while I search the empty silence for clues.

A sign, a call, a whisper in the night,
a stray, murmuring beam of moonlight,
to show the way, to shed some light.

The heart trembling, hides its face,
the mind deadlocked, lost, confused,
the spirit sublime, looks on amused.

"Tarry", tinkles the wind-chime in the breeze,
"Don't go", say the wildly nodding trees,
"Stay awhile, stay awhile", the owl calls.

Riverside retreat

It is Sunday and Mathew is still in Auckland, but the day is warm and bright and tempts me to bask in the sunshine. So I get into the car and take off in the general direction of Kaitoke which I have seen on the map but never visited. On the way, the river gleams in the sunshine and picnikers are splashing about in the knee-deep water or simply lolling about on the grass by the river. I reach Kaitoke in about half an hour and look for a secluded spot not frequented by the river-splashers. There is a little gap in the trees by the river and I get the plastic sheet out of the car together with my lunch and books and settle down under the trees. There are clumps of yellow-orange flowers everywhere as if the sunlight fell on the grass and deciding to stay transformed itself into flowers. It is moist and cool in the shade and the river bounding over rocks and pebbles is beautifully melodious. Slowly the cares of everyday life fall away and reading Osho’s Transformation book transports me into the world of the spirit, where all is peaceful and tranquil. And I come away feeling rejuvenated and refreshed having spent the day in the company of nature whose pace is unhurried and whose source is the Spirit.

Unburdening on the beach

It is Saturday and Mathew is in Auckland so I decide to gift myself the day. I take off for Raumati to meet Joan. Raumati is around 60K from Wellington up the Kapiti coast and there is some breathtaking scenery along the way. As I round the corner of the hill, the sea stretches out before me, languid, in deep shades of aquamarine, the morning sun glinting off the breakers as they curl around the rocks. The traffic is sparse for a Saturday and I reach Joan's at around midday. Joan's standing at the end of her driveway with open arms and a million watt smile. Just seeing her happy to see me is treat by itself. What follows thereafter is a day spent in the company of the sea, wind and sunshine and a special person sharing heartaches and insights and wisdom and understanding. We drive up to Paraparaumu which is a further 10K up the coast and settle down to a long, leisurely lunch sitting outside a café, soaking in the sun, and unburdening ourselves. Life, memories, lessons, challenges, guidance, awakening, the road taken and the road-yet-to-be-taken, all feature in our conversation and sometimes tears threaten to break out from behind the sunglasses.

After lunch we stroll along the beach made more beautiful with driftwood. Then we head back to Joan's place again and after a cup of tea, change into our swimsuits and head for the beach. As I step into the water it feels chilly but as I walk further and further into the waves, the water gets warmer and warmer as my body gets accustomed to the water. The sun shining directly overhead scatters a swathe of dancing, twinkling diamonds on the water and it feels as if the sun is saying to me 'Take all that life has to offer, be alive, be free". And so I get into the flow of the waves. It is a bit windy so the sea is a bit rough, and wave after wave comes crashing over me. And as I lie there I feel the ebb and flow of the tide and the pull of the moon and the expanse of the universe above me and feel so connected with everything. There are only 6 people on the beach and three of us are in the water. Joan's sitting and chatting on the shore with a couple of guys with paddle boats.

Swim over, we go back to Joan's house and I take a shower. By the time I come out some of Joan's friends have arrived with their children and we just sit out on the deck and chill out. It is so good to be in the sun and warmth with the wind tossing the manes of the trees and causing the wind-chimes to tinkle pleasantly. Around six I head back home, my heart glowing with memories of fun and warmth and friendship, of feeling one with the ocean, of browsing through a crystal shop buying crystals, a wind-chime and a Osho Tranformation book.

Thank you God ,for Raumati and its beach, for a laid-back day in the sun and for beautiful friends like Joan.

Trust

I did not die

Do not stand

at my grave and weep.

I am not there.

I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am the diamond glints of snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken

in the morning hush.

I am the swift uplifting rush

of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars

that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry

I am not there;

I did not die.

-Anonymous

I believe

I believe that the realm of possibility is infinite and boundless,
therefore I dream……

I believe that faith has infinite organising power,
therefore I trust that my dreams will come true………

I believe that the Universe provides with whatever you ask
if the motivation behind the asking is Love,
therefore my dreams become manifest.

God speaking

Just had a flash of insight which I thought I must share............

All minds are great. God speaks through all of us, it's just that he is trying to say different things. So the next time you are tempted to label something as stupid, inane, outrageous or even evil, just tell yourself that it is God speaking.

This wisdom was brought home to me one weekend when I was watching a late-night movie, a horror movie, a genre I have never enjoyed. . I don’t know what force pinned me to the sofa through all those senseless murders. But after all the killing and blood and gore, the movie spoke to me. I found a message that was somehow very pertinent to me at that stage of my life.

So now I pay special attention to what people say even though sometimes it sounds flippant or prejudiced. And I watch all kinds of movies, even though I still haven't managed to muster the courage to watch a Govinda movie. Must go and find out what God's saying to me through Govinda.

Desolation

A scream raged within me,
but couldn’t find a voice,
it stormed through my heart,
and held it in a gripping vice.

My heart now is a wasteland city,
a shrine devoid of its deity,
a song shorn of melody,
a festival of all its gaiety.

Among the shambles, the shattered ruins,
I search for a foothold, a light,
this spirit with which to spark,
before the scream brings in the night.

Soul song

Silence,
soft and blessed,
plucks at my heart-strings
with love-tipped fingers,
a rain-scented song arises
like a koel’s call
in the deep silence of the forest.

In this blessed silence,
I hear your footfalls
on the dew-strewn pathways of my heart,
longing gives way to love,
joy breaks free
in the gentle rain of tears.

In this blessed silence
we meet and become one,
there is no You nor I
nor the universe,
just the lightness of nothingness.

The Lord's call

I

Cast aside the dark cloak of the night,
and open your eyes to the blinding light.
Wake up, my child, to the luminous dawn,
come, together let's straddle the sun.
Through the laughing, singing skies let's sail,
infinite, limitless, with glorious trail.

II

Know that you are in Me, and I in you,
in every pain that wounds your heart,
and makes you bleed into the long, dark night.
Tender-hearted, may that pain make you.

In your friend's betrayal, your child's sparkling laughter,
in every joy that makes your spirit sing,
like lark ascending on light-tipped wing.
May gratefulness fill your heart, thereafter.

Saturday stories

Gull politics

It is Saturday and hubby and I are engaged in shopping. We take a break at lunchtime and are sitting on a bench on Petone beach eating hot chips. Soon we are joined by a lone seagull, orange beak, orange feet and orange lined eyes. Hubby throws bits of chips at him and the gull merrily gorges on junk food. We wonder about the fact that he does not even utter a quack to signal to his gull mates that there is food available. But soon another seagull joins us and then the fun begins.

Gull-1 undergoes a transformation. He starts squawking hoarsely and runs after Gull-2, pointed beak open, trying to run him off the place. Now Gull-2 is a smart fellow, he strategically retreats behind the bench where he is content with the bits that hubby throws backwards occasionally. But Gull-1’s squawks have attracted others of his kind and soon we have  a happy crowd of about 10-12 gulls, some of these, we notice, have black feet, beak and kohl-lined eyes. Owing to the fact that these black-eyed beauties are hovering on the fringes, and are smaller in size than the more flamboyant orange eyed-lined fellas, we conclude that the former must be the females.

Gull-1 is now really busy because more gulls are arriving by the minute and he is spending so much time squawking after them and chasing them that he has ceased to notice that bits of food are still being given. In the midst of his squawking and frantic chasing, the newcomers manage to snatch up the food which he has ignored probably with the mistaken belief that he can run all the others off the beach and be the only partaker of the food. Gull-2 at the back has also established his territory and is valiantly defending his turf.

I cannot help think that this is precisely how humans behave too. We are so busy fighting over land and territory that the basic needs of our people get forgotten. There are some countries that probably spend more of their GDP in defence expenditure than in providing food and basic amenities to its people. Even though we know that there are enough resources to feed the whole world, some of us are intent on cornering most of it in a concerted attempt to have more of more totally disregarding the fact that in the process others are getting less of less. When the US went to war in Iraq, they increased their defence budget and guess where the money came from. Some of it came from social welfare, elderly care and basic medical care. They actually cut back spending on these areas.

Sad to think that we are not so highly evolved after all.

~~~

Daane daane par likha hai khane wale ka naam


It is evening and in order to fulfill a greatly felt need for caffeine we stop at a coffee place. We placidly sipping our lattes when Mathew notices that the person at the counter has just thrown a muffin from the tray into the rubbish bin. “Maybe it was damaged, and they didn’t want to sell it”. A short while later we observe that another batch of muffins is being discarded. And then we watch aghast as tray after tray of unsold muffins vanish into the rubbish bin. It is then that we realize that it is closing time and they are throwing away all the unsold food. Our Indian mentality kicks in and we think, what a waste, surely this could have been given to the poor. But where are the poor? The charitable organizations are state-funded and probably wouldn’t need left-over food. What about poor families, new migrants, refugees? We try to work out the logistics involved in taking the food from eateries and carting it to these people. For the amount of labour and time involved we find that for the business owner it is not viable. The amount of food that restaurants, cafés, takeaways discard everyday must be colossal and yet all around the world people go to sleep hungry, die of starvation everyday. 

Kahi daanon par kissi khana wale ka naam nahi hote,
Kissi khane walon ke kismat mein chand daane nahi hote.

~~~

Lambton landscape

Walking down Lambton Quay one bright, warm, sunny afternoon, my senses are flooded with impressions.

People streaming down the sidewalk, dappled sunshine, warm in the sunlight, cool in the shade.

The aroma of coffee, freshly baked cookies, deep-fried fish and chips, curry, canapes, fresh bread, Indian food tinged with banana leaf (olfactory hallucination? Deep-seated desire?)

Baby blue eyes, black sparkling eyes, slanting eyes, sad eyes, sunglassed eyes.

Mothers pushing strollers with babies, mothers pushing strollers with babies in the fathers’ arms, lunchtime family interlude.

'Abra-kebab-ra' selling kebabs, 'Suzette' selling French crepes, 'Chow Mein' selling chow-mein, 'Tastebuds' tempting the tastebuds.

Drooping mouth, kissing-goodbye mouths, cherry-red mouth, sensuously laughing full mouth.

People with pamphlets – ‘Save the children’, ‘Save the forests’, ‘Save the world’.

Flowery skirts, mini skirts, layered skirts, tightly-clinging skirts over swaying legs.

Shop windows beckoning, Christmas trees twinkling, traffic lights turning amber-red-green, steel-glass structures next to elegantly rising churches.

Sautering walk, hurried walk, lazy hip-swinging sexy walk.

Crying children, happily-skipping children, tantrum-throwing children, toddlers gazing fascinated out of mothers’ arms.

Office-goers picnicing on patches of grass, construction workers on scaffolding hammering, lovers walking hand-in-hand.

People waiting at bustops. Waiting for love, waiting for heartbreak. Waiting at the crossing, ‘Don’t walk’, ‘Go’, just like life.

Stockinged feet, tired feet, sandaled feet, spring-in-the-step feet.

Silvery notes of laughter, broken bits of conversation, music pouring from the CD shop, tenor voices raised in carols, meloncholy rising from a one-stringed violin.

A medley of images, smells, sounds impinge on my senses and I come back feeling like I have just visited a painting.

Silence in Haiku

The sound
of hearts breaking
are echoed in silence.

Footfalls of silence
follow
broken dreams.

And yet,
silence also holds
the hint of hope.

Like shards of moonlight,
through black clouds
on the darkest night.

Saviour

Until yesterday I was a girl,
running with the other girls,
braids flying, skirts billowing,
to the river to fetch water,
helping Ma make rotis.

Then the crops failed,
we had nothing left to eat,
Baba looked sad and dejected.
A man came from the city to save us,
gave Baba lots of rupees.

Now I am a woman living in the city.
Men do strange things to my body,
it causes me a lot of pain.
It hurts them too I think,
for they moan and groan.

I wish Ma would come
and massage my limbs,
hold me to her bosom.
I wish I could go into the fields
and shriek into the night.

When I left home Ma was sad
but greatly relieved too.
She said I had saved the family,
saved Baba from certain death.
But who will come and save me?
Inspired, nay provoked by an article I read about a young girl sold into prostitution by her farmer father perhaps to escape starvation. Can't point any fingers here. Sabhi haalaat se majboor hai. Maybe the money brought them some respite, maybe they even prospered, but the girl has a dim chance of escaping her fate. She was sold at 14, became a mother at 16, one more mouth to feed, further entrenchment. Makes one wonder of what use is progress if the poor cannot be empowered.

A Reminding

A long time ago I read a story which for some reason I haven't forgotten yet because the Universe has got into the habit of reminding me about it whenever I tend to forget.

Some time ago (maybe 19th century) when the African jungles were still largely unexplored, an English explorer went to Africa for study and exploration work. He hired some locals to do the navigation and carry his gear and together they set out into the jungles. They would stay in tents during the nights and get up at dawn, cut through the bush, clear a path, do exploration, tent down for the night, next day clear some more bush, go forward etc. This went on for a few days until one morning the Englishman discovered that all his guides had gone on strike and had decided not to move from there for a few days. When he asked them the reason, they said "We have been working and moving and rushing on so fast that we feel that we have left our spirits behind. We need to stay in one place and get back into the rhythm of things so that our spirits can catch up with us".

Over the past few weeks I have been feeling the same. So I decided to slow down to let my spirit catch up. After a long time I listened to music, not the usual background music that I listen to while working at home or office. No, I put everything aside and sat down and actually listened to it with my eyes closed and my spirit reveling in it. Once again I felt my spirit being one with it and swaying and dancing to the music. I took time off from work and did nothing, I mean absolutely nothing, just listened to birdsong ringing out through the raag of the raindrops on the roof. I got back to reading and also came up with a great idea for my next pottery project.

Now the challenge is to see that I stay in this natural rhythm of things and not get carried away by the fast tempo of life. All that we desire for is already there within us, so why do we look for gratification outside ourselves. There is music, joy, laughter, compassion, peace, love. All of it Divine.

Chicken Soup for the Soul

Excerpted from "Chicken Soup for the Soul"

THE RULES FOR BEING HUMAN

1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period of this time around.

2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.

3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial and error. Experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately “works”.

4. A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.

5. Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.

6. “There” is no better than “here”. When your “there” has become a “here”, you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here”.

7. Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself.

8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.

9. Your answers lie inside you. The answers to Life’s questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen and trust.

10. You will forget all this.

Courtesy - Chicken Soup for the Soul

A Chance Encounter

It is 8PM and I have just landed at Wellington Airport after a trip to Hamilton. I had asked for a taxi earlier and sure enough there is a man standing there holding a placard with my name on it. He introduces himself as Dean and even before we have reached his taxi he is already asking me where I work and what I do. He says he used to also work in the IT field for many years in the technical and sales side. He was part of the team taking care of www.stuff.co.nz NZ’s third site in terms of traffic and also was instrumental in getting customers for CityLink, Wellington’s high bandwidth network. I look at him in astonishment and almost involuntarily I ask him why he left all that and became a taxi driver. He said he found his previous job too stressful and he had done it too many years and was looking for a change and he was moonlighting anyway with a taxi so he decided to quit his job and buy a taxi and become self-employed. But his long-term goal is to have his own business maybe computer related. So I ask him what is stopping him and he says ‘plain laziness’.

So for the next half hour we talk about computers and life. I find out that he is divorced with two sons and has a girlfriend but no partner because “Marriage is a bad joke”. “Having boys is fun”. He tells me what courses and diplomas he has done and what jobs he has worked in. He asks me when I started with IT and I say “a long time ago I started with DOS”. It is his turn to look astonished, “I can’t believe that”, he says. And I reply “I am older than I look”. I ask him what sort of highs he gets from taxi-driving as compared to the almost daily highs you get in IT and he says “A high would be a drive from the airport to Paraparamu”. It turns out that he knows about Xplorer the GIS website that EGL creates and that he is acquainted with Ewan the guy at the Upper Hutt City Council that I used to liaise with and we both rediscover that it is a small world indeed.

And then there is a lull in the conversation and I am thinking about what he says about being an entrepreneur and suddenly I am almost thinking aloud about my desire to be an entrepreneur and now it is his turn to ask me in what is stopping me. After we have reached the house and I have paid him and we say our polite goodbyes and he adds, “It was a pleasure talking to you” and somehow for once it seems sincere and not a formality and I am about to say the same thing back but something stops me, maybe the feeling that I might not be able to match his sincerity. And he says "Who knows we might meet again", and I say "Yes, who knows, it is after all a small world". And later on I am thinking how we could talk so freely about things that mean so much to us to a perfect stranger like we were friends going on a drive and not a taxi-driver and his customer. Maybe it is God’s way of reminding me that I have a dream to fulfill and that He can came in any form to remind us of life's lessons.

Mosaic

The aircraft taking us from Hamilton to Wellington is a small one, a 33-seater (I counted) and I exchange seats with my boss to get the window seat. We take off at 7 PM and the sun is still high on the horizon. The plane is flying low so the landscape is still visible. What I see below me is simply breathtaking. A mosaic of green fields which stretch on and on into the horizon, interspersed with pools of water, undulating lines of trees, mounds of little hillocks and scattered all over black and white specks of cows and creams dots of sheep. The clouds have cast a dark shadow which moves as the clouds glide by and then the plane hits a cloud bank. We plough through tufts of soft, cottony, innocent looking clouds, but the plane thinks otherwise because it starts an instant fight and shakes in consternation. But soon the fight is over and we sail clear of the clouds. The landscape below is now bathed in evening sunlight and the grass glows emerald green in the light, trees casting long dark shadows, and the sunlight gleaming off red roofs in tiny hamlets and glinting off windows and lighting up the bodies of little rivulets and ponds.

Then the pilot decided it is time to climb even higher and very soon we are flying over this bank of cumulus, calm and steady and I can’t help thinking that this is how Jonathan Livingston Seagull must have felt when he flew high over the clouds, breaking free of the limits he had hindered himself with, breaking free of accepted convention, daring to live his life and more importantly daring to live his dream. And from up there the cares and troubles of my life seem so insignificant, so puny so as to be totally wiped out. And I realize that if I remain aloft and apart from the drama of my life whose script I have myself written, I can always be in this space of calm and serenity.

And soon we are flying over the Tararuas which is still snow-capped and the windmills over the Manawatu range, until I see the graceful arc of a long river which I discover with joy is our very own Hutt River flowing through Upper Hutt. And there is Stokes Valley right below nestling placidly among hills darkening in the gathering dusk. The road to Wainuomata snaking over the Eastern Hills and the surf gently caressing the sands of the Eastbourne bays. And as the plane turns towards the airport the sun is low over the horizon, almost sinking into the sea, blazing this shimmering, golden path on the water, almost beckoning me to take it. And the land’s end at Happy Valley and the runway comes up to meet us.

Waikato and thereabouts

Day 1 :

My trip to the Waikato University was fascinating. Great campus, spread out among rolling lawns, little lakes, hostel units. This is the only univ here with a Centre for the Performing Arts. We went inside and had a look at the theatres and green rooms. There is one outdoor performance area which is a circular area just by the side of the lake with long steps where the audience can sit. Great setting. If I was close enough I would have come for performances. We had breakfast at an old train station that got converted into a café and lunch at another nice place.

We drove to the Springhill Prison in the afternoon which is still under construction and is also quite big. All very flash. This one is going to have Plasma TV in the recreation areas for the inmates and under-floor heating, because the inmates are vandalising the heaters and it is more cost-effective to have under floor heating. The taxpayers are not too happy. The drive to the hotel was good. It rained for some time, but it was a strange experience. It would rain heavily to near zero-visibility, then taper off, then clear dry roads and sunshine and blue sky, then rain again, then sun again. It seemed like the rain clouds were chasing the car. Finally the rain clouds settled over us and we had rain for the rest of the evening. It was very enjoyable.

Day 2 :

It is beautiful in Waikeria. The Waikeria prison is spread over an area of 500 acres (I think) and the buildings are all spread out with barbed wire fences for each. The rest of the land is pasture with cows and sheep (around 3000 heads of cattle). Some of the inmates work on the farms. We passed by vans with inmates in them going to work. A lot of maize is being grown on farms which is then fed to the cows. There is also a water treatment plant which treats water from the local river for drinking. And the sewer treatment plant treats waste before it is released into the waste water system. There used to be vegetable farms and fruit orchards and nurseries which has now been closed down. But the National govt decided to close them since they were not profit making units. There is a minimum security unit with no barbed wire fence, but with a library and classrooms for inmates wanting to learn. I was driven around the grounds and buildings but did not get into the actual buildings.

It is a beautiful day and the office looks out to green grass and trees and a vast expanse of blue sky. It feels more like I am on holiday than at work. I try to focus on the screen but the landscape keeps calling out to me. We finish at four and take the car back to Hamilton to catch the flight back. It is a beautiful drive, sunny and calm and the pastures laid out on both sides.

Plant your own garden

Author unknown

After a while you learn the subtle difference,

Between holding a hand and

Chaining a soul.

You learn that love

Doesn't mean leaning and

Company doesn't mean security.

You begin to learn

That kisses aren't contracts and

Presents aren't promises.

You begin to accept your defeats

With your head up and your eyes open,

With the grace of an adult,

Not the grief of a child.

You learn to build

All your roads on today

Because tomorrow's ground

Is too uncertain for plans.

After a while you learn

That even sunshine burns

If you get too much.

So you plant your own garden and

Decorate your own soul

Instead of waiting

For someone to bring you flowers.

You learn that you really can endure.

That you really are strong.

You really do have worth.

I bow to Thee, oh Lord

Like a blossoming flower
my spirit opens at your touch Oh Lord,
Soft-footed we walk
through all your creation
forests, valleys, oceans.
Your breath gentle in the wind
Your voice crashing in the waterfall
Your touch the brush of the butterfly wing
The folds of a tree your comforting arms.
Every sunrise your smile
and every sunset your promise.
A child's hand in my hand your trust.

I bow to Thee, oh Lord
Your spirit one with mine.

Fine poetic wine

Reading great poetry is so much like enjoying fine wine, you read each word slowly, turn the liquid around in your mouth, savour the pauses, the aroma, fine-tune into the nuances, let it gently down the throat, let it seep into you. And then after a while you read it again like having a second glass, and then you catch hidden nuances that you missed before, as it slowly reveals its secrets to you. It somehow tastes different on your tongue, beats a softer beat on your heart. And for a long time you sit in the afterglow, feeling warm inside, enthralled by the beauty, oblivious to everything else.

Bookends

The blinking cursor does beckon,
But the keyboard, does it reckon ?
Reams of words unspoken,
Pathways of thoughts untrodden.

And so in silence I wait, for silence
To break its numbing silence.
And then comes a feeling,
Tender, soft-footed and fleeting...

But my heart, the mendicant lonely
With bowl in hand, broken and lowly,
Waits for a crumb from you, a glance
This silence with which to lance.

And still the cursor waits apace,
‘Tween heart and keys there is many a space,
And thus remain my words unsaid,
My tears of joy wholly unshed...

Hope and renewal

Autumn drops a leaf on me,
russet brown and brittle.
It feels like an old dream.

“I shed old leaves, old things”, she says,
“and in nakedness Nature
bares her heart to the winter sun.”

But I, mesmerized by its vivid colours
hold on to this dead, decaying leaf.

Then Spring springs a leaf on me,
russet brown and tender.
It feels like a newborn baby.

“I bring new life, new growth”, she says,
“and in riotous colours Nature
offers it beauty to the summer sun.”

And thus I find the wisdom to let go…
…of old pain, old memories, old hopes.

Tiger Lily and I

Returning home from pottery it is 9PM and I sit in the car for a while in the dark. The sky is dotted with stars and the full moon has not yet risen. Soon, Tiger Lily, our neighbour’s cat jumps on the hood not knowing that I am still in the car (so much for cat vision). Even though her tummy is full with cat food, she still prowls like a cat on a hunt, ears erect, alert to the slightest sound and movement. I have this desire to go out and stroke her fur but I know that on my slightest movement she will disappear. So we sit in silent company waiting for the moon to rise.

I watch her movements as she relaxes and stretches and I send out mental strokes. I am aware of the seconds ticking by and I realize that Tiger Lily is oblivious of the passing moments. So are the trees, the grass, the clouds, the stars…. Each and every one of them (except man) exists outside time, they are just being themselves every moment, all the time. There is no conflict, no tension, no past regrets, no future anticipation, no “what if”, no “if only”. There is only living in the present moment. Just the silent knowledge that God is always there underlying everything. Somehow the thought is strengthening and brings peace.

The amazing Constable

I went to see the John Constable exhibition on tour here at Te Papa on Saturday. What I saw was simply breathtaking. I could have spent the whole day there looking at the paintings again and again. Constable was the son of a prosperous miller and spent a long period of his life around the place he grew up in and painted the scenes of his everyday life with such clarity and such beauty. He evidently loved the place and the love comes through in his paintings. His paintings have a three-dimensional quality and standing in front of them makes you feel like you are actually there watching the scene through the painter's eyes. You are transported back to the place and time almost two centuries ago looking at pastoral scenes or ships in the harbour or London in the distance, thinking 'this is how it was, this is how the painter saw it'. And any moment you expect the leaves to move or the water to start flowing, such is the dynamism in the paintings. Truly a memorable experience.