India Journal, Part 5

Vrindavan is crowded during Kartik. Sometimes the traffic near Krishna Balarama Mandir or further down the main road creates gridlock. All it takes is one or two buses or tempos to stop in the middle of the road. The "shortcut" to Loi Bazaar is via the Bengali neighborhood where the Madan Mohan temple is located. That area is especially historic. The hill on which the original Madan Mohan temple was built is Dwadash Aditya Teela, the place where Lord Krishna rested and warmed up under 12 suns after dancing on Kaliya's heads.

I heard that there were three reasons why Krishna spared the life of Kaliya. First, although he had no interest in bhakti, he permitted his wives, who were devotees, to continue their devotional activities and to see Krishna's pastimes on the banks of the Yamuna. Second, those vaisnavi wives prayed on Kaliya's behalf to Krishna. When Krishna was defeating Kaliya, the wives were at first indifferent to his fate. But when Kaliya realized he was going to die, he repented and it was then that his wives felt compassion for him and asked Krishna to protect him. Finally, once Kaliya had eaten another snake that had been intended as a sacrifice for Garuda. Garuda become angry at this, and brushed Kaliya with his wings, which caused Kaliya to be thrown back. Because of that passing contact with Garuda, Kaliya was purified, and had become eligible for further mercy from the Lord. These things were told to me by Manjari, my former wife, during this visit to Vrindavan. I don't have any sastric reference.

Back on the hill where Madan Mohan mandir is located, the view of the Yamuna in the distance is very nice. Fields of yellow mustard dot the flood plain. Green parrots can be seen flying from treetop to treetop. Next to the old temple is the bhajan kutir where Srila Sanatan Goswami did his bhajan. I also heard that our Srila Prabhupada, when he was a young householder, spent one week here, during his first visit to Vrindavan, doing his own kirtan. This was a few years before he took initiation from his guru maharaj, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Thakur.

Down from the hill and old temple that was later desecrated by soldiers of Arungzeb, a few meters around a back lane is the entrance to Srila Sanatan Goswami's samadhi. Sanatan was much loved by the local Brijbasis as a baba, and at times he would wander from village to village and the villagers would treat him as a family member. He would enter a village and spend only one nite, listening to the everyday problems of the villagers and offering them advice. The next morning they would beg him to stay for at least one more day, but he would move on to the next village. When Sanatan Goswami left his body, many of the Brijbasi men who heard about his passing shaved their heads, as they did when their own fathers died.

It's here in this garden-like setting where Rupa Goswami, Sanatan's younger brother, who accepted Sanatan as his guru, put him in samadhi. Sanatan Goswami helps us to establish our eternal relationship (sambandha) with Krishna. He is the senior of the Six Goswamis whom were sent to excavate Vrindavan and reestablish it as the earthly counterpart to Goloka Vrindavan by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.

India Journal, Part 4

In the West there is little or no contact between human beings except if they are colleagues, friends, family. The society is basically impersonal and increasingly so. In the US, you cannot even talk to a person when you call a business until you navigate thru a series of computer-prompted questions. In India, at least in Vrindavan, there remains a very personal level of exchange in every dealing. Buying fruit from a fruit seller who knows your face and you know his. His friendliness is part of your shopping experience. You get something extra when you go to purchase tangerines.

Vrindavan, being a small town or large village, allows for varieties of personal relationships. Even with the ricksaw wallas, who are immigrants from West Bengal and other parts of India, you can have a satisfying exchange. This trip being short, i decided to be generous with the ricksaw wallas, and rather than the usual practice of haggling and pre-negotiating a price before getting on a ricksaw, i paid them 50% more or even double what i thought the fair price was. That allowed me to be more friendly with them and to see their good qualities. When i paid them, many of them were touched that i gave them something extra. Some were just happy that they were not being treated like trash, that i was showing them a kind of respect by being generous. You know, it's only an extra 10, 20 or 30 rupees. Fifty cents. To them, it meant recognition, a small moment of appreciation.

Since i could not have a regular conversation with the ricksaw wallas in Hindi or Bengali, i could only look at their faces to read their reactions. Those faces showed character, dignity, humility or humor. For me, they were the faces of the struggle for existence, more real and honest and open than the faces i see in the West.

"Bhai Saheb," i called them, "brother sir." Although i was sitting behind them on a seat attached to their bicycle while they were pedaling thru Vrindavan, and although it was a commercial exchange-- their energy for my rupees-- still i felt some kind of personal connection with many of them. Although they were in a subordinate position and i was directing them and paying them, we were both sharing a moment of time together, each in our own way. It is an experience of human dimension and quality that i can't find anywhere else than in Vrindavan. Even the ricksaw wallas can be sages and yogis in Vrindavan.

India Journal, Part 3

Finally i get out of bed in my room at Yamuna Kunj, and open the door which leads to a veranda. From the veranda to the left you can see the white marble towers and brass cakras of the Imli Tala Mandir. The original Imli Tala is the tamarind tree that Krishna sat under during the ras lila after Radha disappeared from His sight. He meditated on Radha and turned a golden color, foreshadowing His appearance as Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. In that avatara, Mahaprabhu returned to this same spot on the Yamuna where he sat and meditated on Himself. It's at this sacred place that the Imli Tala Mandir was built by Sripad Bhakti Sarangi Goswami, a godbrother of Srila Prabhupada. He installed beautiful deities of Sri Sri Radha Gopinath and Sri Sri Gaura Nitai here, as well as the footprints of Lord Caitanya. Sometimes Prabhupada would visit this godbrother's temple when he lived at Radha Damodar.

The sun shines every day in India during this season and it is surprisingly hot in the late morning. I just need a t shirt and lungi and baseball cap as a sunscreen. No coat, jacket, sweatshirt, shoes and socks. Life is simple here.

I pay my obeisances to Imli Tala as i leave Yamuna Kunj and catch a ricksaw to take me to Gopeswar Mahadev, my first stop in Vrindavan. This temple is in the old part of Vrindavan where no tourists come and most pilgrims rarely visit. I buy a 10 rupee garland from one of the flower wallas who sit on the temple steps, take off my shoes and walk in. It's around 11 am and the morning worship is coming to an end. Inside the inner sanctum where Gopiswar Mahadev sits, a brahmin priest presides over the final washing of the Lingam while reciting prayers before the temple closes for midday. I appear with my garland and the priest decides to let me offer it and participate in the worship. First he indicates i can drink some "caranamrita" that has been collected in a gumshaw from the washing of the Lingam. An assistant wrings a piece of the gumshaw into my cupped right hand, and i sip the caranamrita. Then the priest asks me to come close to the Lingam and offers me a lota of clean water to bathe Mahadev. I first ask him to purify my hand that sipped the caranamrita by pouring some water on it, then i take the lota and do my impromptu abhiseka. After the bathing, i bow down on my knees and the priest takes my head and touches it three times to the low silver or brass walls that surround the Lingam. I feel a bit like a child in doing this "forced obeisance" but don't mind since it's for Gopiswar Mahadev. I offer a quick silent prayer while this is happening. Obeisances complete, the priest asks me for a donation. I was already thinking about that. I take out a 50 rupee note and place it on the floor next to the Lingam. The priest looks satisfied and i am also satisfied and get up. He gives me a leaf cup of Lord Siva's maha prasad to take with me as i leave.

On my way out of the inner sanctum, the worker who had given me caranamrita from the gumshaw takes 2 flower garlands that are the maha prasad of Mahadev, and puts them around me. I give him a 10 rupee donation. As i'm leaving the outer temple, a couple of brahmans who are sitting on the floor reading scriptures also indicate that they want a donation. I place two 10 rupee notes on their place sittings. They also appear satisfied. Now i go out to the street. I see a street dog and offer him a piece of the maha prasad by placing it in front of him. A couple of local beggars see that and ask for some maha prasad for themselves. I oblige until there is only a small amount of prasad left, which i pop in my mouth.

From Gopiswar Mahadev it's only 100 meters to Vrinda Kunj, a beautiful ashram developed by my godbrother, Paramadwaiti Swami. I'm glad to see him. Last time we met was one year earlier in Miami. Vrinda Kunj is much nicer than Miami, a green garden with monkeys playing freely, basic bungalows for brahmacaries and guests and an old restored temple for Giriraj. It's ekadasi and i stay for a simple lunch of vegetables and peanuts.

India Journal, Part 2

The auto ricksaw somehow easily finds the dentist's office-- i'm impressed when they find any address in India, since the street names, numbers and directions always seem so confusing to me. I get there 30 minutes before my scheduled appointment and before the office is open. A worker is washing the front steps with water. I go and sit down in the waiting area. A few minutes later the driver of the taxi from Vrindavan that is supposed to meet me there shows up-- one hour early. I guess he has no other gig today. He also comes into the waiting room, looking for a power plug to recharge his mobile. These days, even some ricksaw wallas can be seen playing with their mobiles. (Does anyone actually call them?)

The dentist arrives. He is devotee-friendly, a nice guy and trained in Holland. I am sitting in the dentist chair less than 8 hours after landing in Delhi. He does his work while i listen to Prabhupada on my iPod. (It's a great survival tool for the dentist.) As soon as the appointment is complete i pay my bill by giving the receptionist nine 500 rupee notes and she shakes her head from side to side after counting it to indicate i have paid the correct amount ( i had a two hour appointment). Then i'm off in the subcompact taxi to Vrindavan. The 130 kilometer trip is familiar to me. Getting used to the traffic again is always an adjustment-- especially when my driver decides to go against the traffic-- going south on the northbound lanes of the national highway, to save a few hundred meters while playing chicken with oncoming cars and trucks. I chastise him for this, but it doesn't seem to matter to him.

It's still hot in this part of India in late October and i'm drinking more water than i drink in the West. After a 3.5 hour drive, which includes a stop at the beloved roadside cafe, Hari Om Dubba, we reach Vrindavan, past billboards advertising high-priced apartments for sale. The housing bubble has not yet burst in India it seems. The immediate challenge facing me is to clean my room at Yamuna Kunj which has not been used by anyone for 18 months. I am shocked when i unlock the door and find 5 cm (2 inches) of dust on the floor and most of the furniture, along with extensive webs and a few very large spiders on the walls and ceilings. I have no choice but to start sweeping it out with a straw hand broom i had kept in the room. I use a wet cloth over my nose and mouth to filter the dust. It's the spiders i'm afraid of, not knowing if they are poisonous or not. A devotee downstairs assures me not to worry-- even the scorpions are OK he says-- only Australian scorpios can kill you. Just use the broom to sweep them into an empty bucket. I feel a bit of an intruder to kick them out, but do it gingerly, so as not to cause them to take revenge on me.

It takes about 3 hours for me to clean the room and unpack a few essentials i had kept there-- like a battery operated light for when the power goes out. Miraculously, it still works after sitting uncharged in my almira for 18 months. Finally i try to shake the dust off my two thin cotton mattresses, and assemble my hi-tech mosquito net on the simple wood bed. It's 8 pm and i'm exhausted. I have just enough energy to set up the net and climb into it before falling off to a deep sleep. In the early morning around 5 am, i hear the sounds of kirtan parties chanting as they walk past Yamuna Kunj on the parikram marg. It reminds me that yes, i'm in the holy dham, far from the maddening material society. I know that it's better to be here, in bed, hearing the kirtaniyas, than to be out there, anywhere, doing just about anything that produces karma. It's my first morning in the dham and i have 10 days ahead of me. I enjoy the moment and the hope of recharging my spiritual life in a natural way, and blissfully drift back to sleep.

India Journal, Part 1

I'm writing this as the polls in America are open and the final crescendo of news hype in the presidential election pervades the media here. It's one day and a parallel universe since i landed from Vrindavan. It's such a different world-- India and Vrindavan-- from the West. For someone who is searching for transcendence, and particularly for devotion, Vrindavan offers hope and affection, while the West offers depression and distraction.

It's not that everything is better there. Lots of things are much better here and many things much worse there. Perhaps i will elaborate on this in a later post. But i promised to share some details of my experiences of my visit to Vrindavan, so i will start today with my arrival in India. I did not take notes or record a journal, so these impressions are from memory.

As soon as i walked off the Air India flight from London and took my first steps at the Delhi airport, there was a familiar smell in the air. It is the smell of India. I am not exactly sure wherefrom or what that smell is, but it is distinctive. It's always my first impression of India, since my very first visit there in 1973. Then as now, i'm struck looking at the faces of the airport workers, so different from the working class in the West. And the architecture, despite renovations, seems stuck in a 1960s retro mode, but that just adds to the sense that one has arrived in a different world.

Going thru immigration is painless-- no questions, just the formality of getting the passport stamped-- and keeping the slip of paper to give to the Customs agent on the way out. Then queueing up just outside the airport at the Pre-paid taxi stand. Usually a taxi from Vrindavan is waiting for me, but this time i'm spending a few hours in Delhi (it's 3 am when i land) and i'm going to the dentist later in the morning. I pay 330 rupees for a pre-paid taxi to East of Kailash, where the Iskcon temple is located. I'm going to spend 4 or 5 hours at the guest house before my dentist appointment. The agent taking my rupess for the pre-paid taxi does not give me change from the 500 rupee note i give him for the fare. I take the ticket and start to leave, before remembering he owes me 170 rupees. My first reminder: in India you need to pay attention to details. Sometimes people will be honest with you. Often they will try to cheat you. Westerners have targets on their backs for easy pickings. I ask for my change and he grudgingly gives it to me.

The taxi driver doesn't speak any English, but i keep repeating Hare Krishna Mandir and he knows where it is. When we get to the temple, the chokidar (guard) directs us to another gate for the guest house. That gate is locked and the chokidar is asleep in a house behind the gate. He doesn't want to get up and open the gate, but finally consents to letting me leave the taxi and walk thru the gate. When i finally find my way to guest house (no signs are visible), the worker there looks like he could have been there 100 years ago. He can't find my name in the guest register and tells me i have no reservation. I know i have one, since someone made it for me. After several attempts of insisting i had a booking, he makes a call and then tells me my booking is at "The New Guest House," which is outside the gates of the temple complex, about 300 meters away. I try to negotiate to stay where i am, but it's not possible, according to the peon who is the night manager. He does convince me that the "new guest house" is not far and i decide to go off into the black nite to find it. I walk out the gate and cross the street, walk down a lane where again there are no signs to be seen, but as i walk, the chokidar from the new guest house is waiting for me, and pulls me in. I sign in with a 25 year old life membership card i have, which entitles me not to a free room but a subsidized price of 150 rupees for my short stay. The chokidar walks me to my room on the third floor. It has a fan that works only on the fastest speed. It also has an attached toilet and water for a bucket bath.

It's 4:30 am, so i decide to go across the street and begin my pilgrimmage by attending mangal arotik for Radha Parasarathi, the Deities installed by Srila Prabhupada in Delhi in the early 70's. I need to walk thru a metal detector and security guard to get into the temple grounds. The guard asks me for my room number at the guest house and that seems to satisfy him. I walk into the temple and pay my dandavats to Srila Prabhupada, Gaura Nitai, Sita Ram Laksman and Hanuman, and Sri Sri Radha Parasarathi. The arotik concludes, i sit in the back of the temple room while one devotee makes some announcements and then i go back to my room to rest for 3 hours, lying under a sheet while the fan spins at top speed, until 8:30 am when i get up, take a bucket shower and leave the guest house with my things to catch an auto rikshaw to the dentist's office. My Kartik trip has begun.

Just Back from Vrindavan dham

I just returned this evening from 10 days in Sri Vrindavan dham. It was a trip worth taking, from the taxi ride from Delhi airport to the plane ride back. I will share some of my impressions over the next few days while they are still fresh with me. In one sense, Vrindavan stands still as a place where bhakti can be seen and practiced. In other ways, (at least what we see and hear of it with our senses) it's a place that is changing and being influenced by the forces of time and culture. Perhaps no where else is that contrast (between the eternal and the temporal) so clear as in Vrindavan dham. Details soon.

God as One of Us

Unhelpful for establishing the tone McCain sought in Davenport was the Rev. Arnold Conrad, past pastor of the Grace Evangelical Free Church. His prayer before McCain arrived at the convention center blocks from the Mississippi River appeared to dismiss faiths other than Christianity and cast the election as a referendum on God himself.

"I would also pray, Lord, that your reputation is involved in all that happens between now and November, because there are millions of people around this world praying to their god — whether it's Hindu, Buddha, Allah — that his opponent wins, for a variety of reasons," Conrad said.

"And Lord, I pray that you would guard your own reputation, because they're going to think that their god is bigger than you, if that happens. So I pray that you will step forward and honor your own name with all that happens between now and Election Day," he said.

Yep, don't allow their Hindu God or Buddha God or Allah God to compete with our red, white and blue, evangelical Christian God. No one can be greater than "our" god-- fearful, hateful and intolerant, just like us. Pray and pass the ammunition.

Self-fulfilling Meanness

"As nearly as possible, no nationalist ever thinks, talks, or writes about anything except the superiority of his own power unit. It is difficult if not impossible for any nationalist to conceal his allegiance. The smallest slur upon his own unit, or any implied praise of a rival organization, fills him with uneasiness which he can relieve only by making some sharp retort," - George Orwell, the author of 1984.

Almost all politics and religion as practiced in today's world incites and panders to prejudices and sectarian thinking. The most powerful sects in today's world are nations and state-approved or accepted religions. These social structures bring a sense of national and religious identity that is self promoting. While praising its own merits and sanctity, national and religious identification divides rather than unifies; it pits one group as insiders against a hostile world of "outsiders." This identification is essentially based on temporary designations and mental impulses. It creates paranoia against self-exacerbated threats from "others." Such identification polarizes and creates frustration and anger. False friends and false enemies produce a self-fulfilling meanness. What it cannot produce is peace and harmony in human society.

Patriotism and religious fanaticism are similar. It's not as obvious when it's your sect rather than your flag. But as Srila Prabhupada put it, it's all skin disease. That includes today's Iskcon, Narayan Maharaj's sanga and other vaisnava groups who cannot tolerate openness, transparency and accountability. It's the tyranny of fundamentalism.

Uddhava's Gita

The Uddhava Gita

The other day i received a request to review the recent publication of the Uddhava Gita, the heart of the 11th Canto Srimad Bhagavatam, where Lord Krishna personally speaks to Uddhava just as He is about to depart this planet. These are the Lord's final instructions to us, his parts, who now find ourselves the unhappy residents on this troubled earth. These instructions are a continuation of Sri Krishna's penultimate teaching to Arjuna at Kuruksetra, a Bhagavad Gita, Part II. The Uddhava Gita gets its name from one of the Lord's dearest and most confidential associates who was sent from Mathura to Vrindavan as Krishna's personal representative to the gopis.

With commentaries and purports by two of the greatest vaisnava acaryas, Srila Visvanath Cakravarti Thakur and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur, this new volume of the 11th Canto by Touchstone Media is a gold mine for serious devotees. By serious, i mean those devotees who have "seen it, heard it and done it" in terms of material dealings, and who are now on the cusp of proper detachment. Those who do not seek fame, glory or profit from bhakti (as most kanistha adhikaris are apt to do, without admitting it to themselves or others), but rather, those who are tired of the endless ego games and who are thirsty for inner peace and humble service to the Lord are the rare, truly qualified readers of such transcendental literature.

I know Isvara Das, the publisher of Uddhava Gita, from Vrindavan. He has been a prolific independent producer of important vaisnava texts over the last decade. Isvara prabhu has single-handedly published a body of work that contributes much to our Gaudiya Vaisnava siddhanta.... filling the lacuna created by the BBT, who instead of producing new works or adding useful compendia to Srila Prabhupada's vast literary output, have been busy attacking the founder-acarya's original translations with editorial revisions bordering on (or even surpassing) the offensive.

The Uddhava Gita by Touchstone Media is unlike some of the BBT's works in this regard. It is not just dedicated to Srila Prabhupada but serves him by presenting the words of two great previous acaryas without alteration or self indulgence. It is stylistically based on Prabhupada's books, presenting the original Sanskrit verses from the Bhagavatam, Roman transliterations, English translations, and complete commentaries by Srila Cakravarti and Sarasvati Thakurs. It also contains glossaries of terms used and a general index. It is 820 pages.

Thankfully, this translation of the 11th Canto is refreshing in its conspicuous absence of arrogant purports by Hridayananda Das written and published during the great zonal acarya epoch in Iskcon. That era produced a translation that was polluted with grandiose statements about the soon-to-be-fallen zonal gurus of Iskcon. The BBT has probably removed the most egregious content from those volumes, but i still remember my discomfort in reading the commentaries and i refused to accept them as a companion to Prabhupada's Bhagavatam. It is indeed sad that even the highest things, such as this 11th Canto, considered the Crown on the Head of Sri Krishna, can be made temporary hostages of darkness. This publication remedies some of the shame and disgrace done in the name of Srila Prabhupada by offering a transparent translation of the commentaries by Visvanath Cakravarti Thakur and Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur.

In the first chapter, Srila Sarasvati Thakur tells us, for example, in a purport to the 32nd verse:
"Those who are averse to Krishna and who are full of anarthas are always busy lording it over material objects. They spend their days accomplishing the three objectives of life— religiosity, economic development, and sense gratification. Their only aim is to enhance their duration of life, as well as their glories and beauty. Because Avadhuta Mahasaya did not display any such behavior, King Yadu asked him the reason for his wandering about in this way. In reply, the avadhuta said: 'Rather than accepting these twenty-four entities that are observed within this visible world as the means of my enjoyment, I have accepted them as my instructing spiritual masters, giving up the conception of accepting something and rejecting something else. I do not live like an ordinary human being, who is driven by mental speculation and thus bereft of the service of a spiritual master. I travel in this world under the shelter of my fixed intelligence. With a desire to surpass all anarthas and to always render loving service to the Supreme Lord, I have taken shelter of these twenty-four spiritual masters.'”

A few verses later, in verse 44, the avadhuta tells the King:
"O King, a saintly person is naturally pure, free from all contaminations, well behaved, and a benefactor of all human beings. Just by seeing, touching, or hearing such an exalted soul, one is purified just as one is cleansed by bathing with pure water. A saintly person, like a holy place of pilgrimage, purifies all those who meet him, because he is always engaged in chanting the glories of the Lord. "

And Cakravarti Thakur comments on this verse:
"Now the lesson to be learned from water is being described. Water is by nature pure and cooling. It is considered to be affectionate toward everyone. Water is sweet. Saintly persons are also sweet by nature and they purify all living entities by instructing them about devotional service. Saintly persons should behave as the well-wishing friend of everyone, just like water. Devotees purify everyone, just as water purifies everything by its contact."

A real devotee is a well-wishing friend of everyone. Like water, he or she is affectionate, pure and cooling towards all. What matters to a devotee is what is pure, not what is popular. Where we find real affection, real humanity, real purification is where we find a real devotee.

Without the company of such devotees, no amount of mental, intellectual or quasi-spiritual assets have any true value. Without having such association, we can only feel deep sadness and separation. We can try our best to hear from such saintly persons via these books and the recordings of pure devotees. This is our only source of hope.

The spiritual ocean that is Bhagavad-gita is thus expanded in the ocean of the Uddhava-gita. True to form, the Lord always glorifies his devotees as He instructs them. Thus, we can praise the unexcelled good fortune of both Arjuna and Uddhava, the extremely confidential friends and direct disciples of Bhagavan Sri Krishna. And pray to get more and more opportunity to drop all remaining pretense so that we can receive these profoundly pure teachings and they will act on our hearts. Books such as Uddhava Gita and the original Bhagavad-gita As It Is (1972) give us this chance.

All the books, dvds and other media produced by Touchstone Media can be accessed and purchased at www.touchstonemedia.com

Chasing After You

A small offering at the lotus feet of om visnupada paramhamsa 108 Sri Srimad A.C. Bhativedanta Swami Prabhupada, on his holy Vyasa Puja (Birth Anniversary)

Part 1
Sometimes history is cruel, Srila Prabhupada.
It turns rulers into fools.

It takes ambitious devotees and corrupts them into thieves.
I'm sorry, i'm referring to your crooked GBCs.

Sometimes i wonder who i am, Srila Prabhupada.
Am i really your man, ready to risk and even die?
Or am i just a caterpillar, a wannabe butterfly?

Easily i can see the faults in all others,
but how come i'm not a more solid brother?

You conquered my heart with your spotless sincerity,
but wherefrom do i feel all these heavy impurities?

Part 2
Srila Prabhupada, once i sat with you in your room in Tehran, and i felt your presence surround me.
After 30+ years the bond is not broken, but the inspiration's gone in the darkness around me.

Yes, you were the light of the moon and the sun for your spiritual daughters and enthusiastic sons.
You always lit up the hearts of your gentle, faithful ones.

For those who decided to usurp your spiritual powers,
you vanished like a yogi and became a plastic model.

They waved your flag like crusaders, just to game their way,
but like Karna at Kuruksetra, their strength will fail them
when it's time to pay.

It's you who steals the hearts of those whose souls are dear,
If someone tries to steal you, you simply disappear.

Part 3
Now my prayer becomes more real,
as i need to tell you frankly what my weak heart reveals.

O Prabhupada, when i look into my heart and see my own conceit,
i know my tears are insufficient, my surrender incomplete.

Surrender is not a show, a dress, success or popularity poll.
It's the battle to give up all things unfavorable, the desire to control.

Srila Prabhupada, of your golden legacy, i'm just a petty thief.
Calling myself 'disciple,' but resisting your lotus feet.

What am i doing in this world? What opulence do i have?
Credit cards and shopping bags, senses like 2nd class rags.

Part 4
When will i discard my anarthas and naked run behind you?
Like a humble, hungry dog who wants only to find you?

O master, they can curse me, tease me or beat me blue,
as long as i can keep on running and chasing after you....

Srila Prabhupada, i'm still fallen, a jiva gone astray.
Guide me to your shelter, by hook or crook someway.

You're my president, my true friend, my deepest love, my lord,
in every word, every step and every type of chord.

In my in breath and out breath, each and every birth and death,
may you always be my goal, my heaven, my moksa, my test.

Part 5
Srila Prabhupada, steal my mind and be my inner heart's thief.
Uproot my illusions. Cut this broken-hearted grief.

By your mercy, and by the power of your love for me,
open my eyes to All-Attractive Krishna Conscious Reality.

Nitya nityanam centanas cetananam.....

Your life was the perfect purport of this Katha Upanisad verse.
You purify my existence when i hear you chant these words.

Srila Prabhupada, let your presence within me be my single-minded truth.
Transform me into what you named me:
a liberated servant of the Ever-Fresh Youth.


your melancholy and impoverished sisya,

nava jauvana das