Joy is brief.
Sorrow and grief are endless.
The mind's an elephant,
mad,amnesiac.
Air and flame burn as one,
just as when the moth, its eye enchanted by light,
flies straight into the lamp,
and wing and fire flare together.
Who hasn't found
restful peace in a moment of pleasure?
So you brush aside the truth,
and chase the lies you hold so dear.
At the end of your days
you feel the temptation, you covet joy,
even though old age and death
are close at hand.
The world's embroiled in illusion,error:
this is the process always in motion.
Man attains a human birth:
why does he waste and destroy it?
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Ant -BY KABIR
Beware of the world,
brothers,
be alert---
you're being robbed
while wide awake.
Beware of the Vedas,
brothers,
be vigilant---
Death will carry you away
While the guard
looks on.
The neem tree
becomes the mango tree,
the mango tree becomes
the neem,
the banana plant
spreads into a bush--
the fruit on the coconut palm
ripens into berry
right under your noses,
you dumb and foolish
rustics!
Hari becomes sugar
and scatters Himself
in the sand.
No elephant can sift
the crystals from the grains.
Kabir says, renounce
all family, caste, and clan.
Turn into an ant,
instead---
pick the sugar from the sand
and eat.
Where the mind is without fear-By Rabindranath Tagore
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake
Bulleh! to me, I am not known
| ||||||||||||
The Traveler
--By Laxmi Prasad Devkota
Translated By Pratit Gurung
Which Sanctuary are you visiting, Oh! traveler?
Which temple are you going to?
What will you offer in worship oh traveler?
How will you take it with you?
To which kingdom are you going to? riding upon people's backs!
Your bones are marvelous columns,
Your muscles are the walls
Your brain is the golden roof,
which are doors to the senses!
Your veins are the flow of rivers,
A temple in itself incomparably Marvelous!
Oh! Which temple will you go Pilgrim?
To which temple's door?
In the glorious throne of the Mind,reigns the Almighty
Your infinite rays of consciousness, is its apex crown
This wonderful temple of the body,amidst the universe!
God is within but your eyes are outside,which city are you searching in?
God resides in the depth,for how long will you drift on the surface?
If you're seeking,illuminate your heart with the shining light of passion
Oh! Pilgrim friend! God walks along with you in the middle of the road
God kisses the hands of the working man who works selflessly
With divine grace does it hold its servant's hands!
the almighty sings by the side of the road in the song of birds
The almighty speaks in the songs of human pain and suffering
Yet, nowhere will it reveal itself to our physical eyes
To which temple will you go traveler?
To which strange promised land?
Return,return...oh! traveler
Go and hold the feet of the people!
Put ointment in the rankling wounds of the afflicted
Be human and make god's divine face smile......
Translated By Pratit Gurung
Which Sanctuary are you visiting, Oh! traveler?
Which temple are you going to?
What will you offer in worship oh traveler?
How will you take it with you?
To which kingdom are you going to? riding upon people's backs!
Your bones are marvelous columns,
Your muscles are the walls
Your brain is the golden roof,
which are doors to the senses!
Your veins are the flow of rivers,
A temple in itself incomparably Marvelous!
Oh! Which temple will you go Pilgrim?
To which temple's door?
In the glorious throne of the Mind,reigns the Almighty
Your infinite rays of consciousness, is its apex crown
This wonderful temple of the body,amidst the universe!
God is within but your eyes are outside,which city are you searching in?
God resides in the depth,for how long will you drift on the surface?
If you're seeking,illuminate your heart with the shining light of passion
Oh! Pilgrim friend! God walks along with you in the middle of the road
God kisses the hands of the working man who works selflessly
With divine grace does it hold its servant's hands!
the almighty sings by the side of the road in the song of birds
The almighty speaks in the songs of human pain and suffering
Yet, nowhere will it reveal itself to our physical eyes
To which temple will you go traveler?
To which strange promised land?
Return,return...oh! traveler
Go and hold the feet of the people!
Put ointment in the rankling wounds of the afflicted
Be human and make god's divine face smile......
Do not believe.... -Tathāgata Buddha
“Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”
An Old Poem of J. Krishnamurti:
I have no name,
I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.
I have no shelter; I am as the wandering waters.
I have no sanctuary,
like the dark gods; Nor am I in the shadow of deep temples.
I have no sacred books; Nor am I well-seasoned in tradition.
I am not in the incense Mounting on the high altars,
Nor in the pomp of ceremonies.
I am neither in the graven image,
Nor in the rich chant of a melodious voice.
I am not bound by theories,
Nor corrupted by beliefs.
I am not held in the bondage of religions, Nor in the pious agony of their priests.
I am not entrapped by philosophies, Nor held in the power of their sects.
I am neither low nor high,
I am the worshiper and the worshiped.
I am free.
My song is the song of the river Calling for the open seas,
Wandering, wandering, I am Life.
I have no name, I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.
I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.
I have no shelter; I am as the wandering waters.
I have no sanctuary,
like the dark gods; Nor am I in the shadow of deep temples.
I have no sacred books; Nor am I well-seasoned in tradition.
I am not in the incense Mounting on the high altars,
Nor in the pomp of ceremonies.
I am neither in the graven image,
Nor in the rich chant of a melodious voice.
I am not bound by theories,
Nor corrupted by beliefs.
I am not held in the bondage of religions, Nor in the pious agony of their priests.
I am not entrapped by philosophies, Nor held in the power of their sects.
I am neither low nor high,
I am the worshiper and the worshiped.
I am free.
My song is the song of the river Calling for the open seas,
Wandering, wandering, I am Life.
I have no name, I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.
TIME AND RELIGION (DISCOURSE BY:OSHO RAJNEESH)
Religion is not knowledge,it is knowing.......
Knowledge is of the mind, knowing is of the being.
So, the first thing to be understood is the difference between knowledge and knowing.
Knowledge is never of the present,it is of the past.
Knowing has only the Present.And remember,present is not part of time.People ordinarily think that time is divided between past and future,present is not a part of time at all. You cannot catch hold of it in time. Pursue it and you miss......... Present is eternity crossing time...........
Knowledge is of the mind, knowing is of the being.
So, the first thing to be understood is the difference between knowledge and knowing.
Knowledge is never of the present,it is of the past.
Knowing has only the Present.And remember,present is not part of time.People ordinarily think that time is divided between past and future,present is not a part of time at all. You cannot catch hold of it in time. Pursue it and you miss......... Present is eternity crossing time...........
THE PARROT IN THE CAGE
Lekhnath Paudyal
(Translated by L.P. Devkota)
A parrot called a bird, a twice-born child,
By Fate into an iron cage beguiled,
I find, O God, nor peace nor quiet rest,
For even in a dream I lie oppressed.
My parents and relations that there are,
Do in a forest corner dwell afar.
To whom shall I my agonies outpour,
From this, my iron cage, lamenting sore?
Sometimes my tears roll down my swelling eyes,
At times I feel a corpse, my spirit flies,
At other times I madden and I jump,
Recalling woodland pleasures with a lump.
A poor and little forest wanderer I,
Fed on wild fruits, delighted who did fly,
Have been by Fate allured into this cage,
Destiny, O, has strange mysterious ways.
How far might I have freely roamed and flown,
Into what different countries soared and gone!
Alas! In vain, why Fate has me beguiled,
Into this dungeon, a forest-wandering child.
Cool waters and cool shades of verdant wood,
Really delicious fruits to pick for food.
Ah! All those things are vanished dreams today,
What now remains? A fear, my mind must sway.
Delightful shades of forests, rich and green,
Affection for the dear ones that have been
Feasting on food and wandering in the wild
Have now become but dreams to this poor child.
My aged ailing parents for me pine,
Tears in their eyes, dejected, dropping brine,
They may be everyday beating their breast,
Our close ties broken, Fate has us oppressed.
I see but enemies all around me lie,
There’s not a thing on which I can rely.
What shall I do? And how effect a flight?
To whom unburden woes in this sad plight?
The bird to whom the open boundless blue
Was field for flights of pleasure to renew
Has now, alas, for his life’s single stay
A narrow cage of iron here today.
Seeking to break this dungeon open here,
Against the bars that check my free career,
The hard-struck beak is blunted, wings and feet
Are cramped. How shall I pass long days? Defeat!
Sometimes the cramping cold, sometimes the heat,
A prattling now, and then a silent seat.
After the varying whims of boys that play,
My fate changes her course perverse today.
When I recall the shows sad Fate displays,
Then like a mad thing do I pass my days,
My tears pour down, then cracks and breaks my breast,
My heart constantly wails by Fate oppressed.
Dark apprehensions in long waves arise,
Shocked and bewildered, I survey the skies.
Without Death’s call the life-breath cannot cease,
Excruciating must I end my lease.
A stinted measure of some third class rice,
That, half a fill, doth Destiny devise.
I cast a thirsty glance upon the pot
Devoid of water, such is my life’s sad lot.
Dry is my throat, my bondage sharp and tight,
A prating still compelled, I hate downright.
Should I refuse to speak, brandishing cane,
They threaten me with thrashing once again.
One says, “Look here! This is an ass’s colt!”
Another says, “He is displeased! Behold!”
A third induces me God to repeat,
Says, “Atmaram! Read on! Be famed! A wit!”
What sort of fellow is this tiny life?
How comes he here? What food and of which type,
Takes he within this cage? There’s none to know.
And so my heart must tingle in my woe.
To be a life subjected to a bond,
And to be forced to callers to respond.
Strange Fate! Thou giv’st me yet such stinted measure
Of sustenance! How hard, they cruel pleasure.
Hard Providence! Thou didst me just provide
With power of speech and reasoning, my pride,
And this has been the parent of my woes—
Scolding and threats, and a confinement close.
Man must indulge in strange and merry sport,
Anguishing me, a cage for my resort.
How sinful is this human course, this crime,
Help me escape, O Pitying God sublime!
The human race hostile to virtues fair,
Exploits the worthy till the breast dries sheer.
Till winged breath be taken not away,
How should it be content or kind today!
So long as on this wide terrestrial plain
A single human being shall remain,
O Lord! Let not a parrot’s life be given,
Suddenly comes a sense to me, O Heaven!
(Translated by L.P. Devkota)
A parrot called a bird, a twice-born child,
By Fate into an iron cage beguiled,
I find, O God, nor peace nor quiet rest,
For even in a dream I lie oppressed.
My parents and relations that there are,
Do in a forest corner dwell afar.
To whom shall I my agonies outpour,
From this, my iron cage, lamenting sore?
Sometimes my tears roll down my swelling eyes,
At times I feel a corpse, my spirit flies,
At other times I madden and I jump,
Recalling woodland pleasures with a lump.
A poor and little forest wanderer I,
Fed on wild fruits, delighted who did fly,
Have been by Fate allured into this cage,
Destiny, O, has strange mysterious ways.
How far might I have freely roamed and flown,
Into what different countries soared and gone!
Alas! In vain, why Fate has me beguiled,
Into this dungeon, a forest-wandering child.
Cool waters and cool shades of verdant wood,
Really delicious fruits to pick for food.
Ah! All those things are vanished dreams today,
What now remains? A fear, my mind must sway.
Delightful shades of forests, rich and green,
Affection for the dear ones that have been
Feasting on food and wandering in the wild
Have now become but dreams to this poor child.
My aged ailing parents for me pine,
Tears in their eyes, dejected, dropping brine,
They may be everyday beating their breast,
Our close ties broken, Fate has us oppressed.
I see but enemies all around me lie,
There’s not a thing on which I can rely.
What shall I do? And how effect a flight?
To whom unburden woes in this sad plight?
The bird to whom the open boundless blue
Was field for flights of pleasure to renew
Has now, alas, for his life’s single stay
A narrow cage of iron here today.
Seeking to break this dungeon open here,
Against the bars that check my free career,
The hard-struck beak is blunted, wings and feet
Are cramped. How shall I pass long days? Defeat!
Sometimes the cramping cold, sometimes the heat,
A prattling now, and then a silent seat.
After the varying whims of boys that play,
My fate changes her course perverse today.
When I recall the shows sad Fate displays,
Then like a mad thing do I pass my days,
My tears pour down, then cracks and breaks my breast,
My heart constantly wails by Fate oppressed.
Dark apprehensions in long waves arise,
Shocked and bewildered, I survey the skies.
Without Death’s call the life-breath cannot cease,
Excruciating must I end my lease.
A stinted measure of some third class rice,
That, half a fill, doth Destiny devise.
I cast a thirsty glance upon the pot
Devoid of water, such is my life’s sad lot.
Dry is my throat, my bondage sharp and tight,
A prating still compelled, I hate downright.
Should I refuse to speak, brandishing cane,
They threaten me with thrashing once again.
One says, “Look here! This is an ass’s colt!”
Another says, “He is displeased! Behold!”
A third induces me God to repeat,
Says, “Atmaram! Read on! Be famed! A wit!”
What sort of fellow is this tiny life?
How comes he here? What food and of which type,
Takes he within this cage? There’s none to know.
And so my heart must tingle in my woe.
To be a life subjected to a bond,
And to be forced to callers to respond.
Strange Fate! Thou giv’st me yet such stinted measure
Of sustenance! How hard, they cruel pleasure.
Hard Providence! Thou didst me just provide
With power of speech and reasoning, my pride,
And this has been the parent of my woes—
Scolding and threats, and a confinement close.
Man must indulge in strange and merry sport,
Anguishing me, a cage for my resort.
How sinful is this human course, this crime,
Help me escape, O Pitying God sublime!
The human race hostile to virtues fair,
Exploits the worthy till the breast dries sheer.
Till winged breath be taken not away,
How should it be content or kind today!
So long as on this wide terrestrial plain
A single human being shall remain,
O Lord! Let not a parrot’s life be given,
Suddenly comes a sense to me, O Heaven!
DERANGED
Laxmi Prasad Devkota is Nepal's most loved Poet for good reason:
The anguish he expresses in the poem below, written against the madness created by an authoritarian state, resonates perfectly today. Devkota's outburst is not just an expression of romantic over-sensitivity: it is a rebellion against a society out of kilter, where a shrewd, loquacious class keeps spinning webs to trap people and foil their bid to live freely.
DERANGED
Certainly, friend! I'm deranged!
Such is my state!
I see words, hear images, taste smells,
touch things that are slighter than the sky.
things whose existence no one admits to,
whose shape the world does not know
I see rocks as flowers
when by the river bank those slick, delicate, heavenly trick-
sters laugh
looking at me in the moonlight, unfolding in redolence, and
stand-
awakening, transforming, softening, swelling, shining, they
stand-
a kind of moon-bird's fruit like a mute mad flower!
I talk to them as they talk to me!
One language, friend! which isn't written, printed, spoken,
explained, told.
By the moonlit banks of the Ganges their tongues come in
waves,friend,
waves, waves!
Certainly, friend! I'm deranged!
Such is my state!
You are shrewd and loquacious! Your (a+b) class a2 + ab + b2
goes on and on
But in my arithmetic
if one is detracted from one, what remains is one
You work with the five senses, I with the sixth
You have brains, my friend! I have heart!
You can't see a rose as anything but a rose
I find it to be Padmini and Helen
You are powerful prose, I am fluid verse
You freeze when I melt
You become limpid when I grow turbid-
and also the opposite!
Your world is solid, mine vaporous
Your world is thick, mine thin
You take a rock as an object, solid: hardness is your reality
I try to hold onto dreams just as you hold onto
those cold, luscious coins with engraved letters
I have the ardour of thorns, friend! You of gold and coins
I have the tempo of thorns, friend! You of gold and diamonds
You deem the hills dumb, I deem them loquacious
Certainly, friend! My one inebriation lags behind
Such is my state!
Everyone called me erratic when they saw me warming myself
on the white, primary heat of the stars in the cold winter months
They said a ghost had entered me when I stared blankly for
seven days
after returning from the cremation pyres
They said I'd gone mad when they saw me cry for forty days
seeing a spray of forty-five year-old frost on a strand of your hair
They called me insane when they saw me dance to the first
cuckoo of Spring
When suffocated by a soundless new moon
I leaped at the pain of extinguishing
and the idiots placed me in stocks
I had just started to sing with the typhoons one day
and the learned people delivered me to an asylum
One day I had stretched out flat, thinking I had died
A friend pinched me and said-
'Oh madman! Your flesh isn't dead yet'
I have called the Nawab's alcohol blood, and the whore a
corpse
I have called the king poor, and have scolded Alexander
I have criticised the saints
and placed individuals of no import on the seventh realm of
praise
Your grand pundits are my idiots, your heaven my hell
Your gold is my iron
Friend! Your religious duty is my sin!
When you consider yourself intelligent I see you an imbecile
Your progress is my regression, friend!
Such turmoil in these bargains, friend!
Your cosmos is a child to me
Certainly, friend! I am moonstruck, utterly moonstruck!
This is my state!
I see the blind as the world's leaders! I see hermits in caves as
evaders!
I see those who stand atop false platforms to be dark dancers
I see the unsuccessful as successful, the ascetic as unsuc-
cessful
I see progress as stagnation,
Will I be pushed around, or will I be a councillor
Friend! I'm a councillor!
See the whorish jig of shameless leadership's bland tongue!
See the break in the back of people's rights!
See today's cracked crystals, selling as diamonds!
When the black lies of sparrow-sized headlines
call my brave reason to battle with deceitful enigmas
then-my cheeks flush hard, my friend!
My cheeks flush as red as glowing coals!
When the meek people imbibe black poison
through both their ears, before my eyes, saying it is nectar-
friend! My every hair stands on end!
My each hair twists, harried like snakes in the sky
when I see a tiger about to eat a deer, friend!
And the terrible power of the sage's soul
tries to enter my corroded bones and speak
Friend!
the day when a thunderbolt falls from heaven
when people do not consider people to be people
my jaws start to ache like mighty Bhimsen's jaws
and I turn the red balls of my enraged insane eyes
looking in a double as a bolt of flames upon
this human land of the inhuman-
My machine parts leap about
in uproar and agitation
My breath becomes a typhoon-
My face distorts
My brain lights up afire, friend!
like the fires submerged in the seas-
I become as mad as fires that consume entire forests
Insane, friend!
Like I might swallow the wide world raw!
Certainly, friend! I, stunning mythical moon-bird
hideous-soiled-soft-unkind bird
stealer of heaven's fire-
son of typhoons, an expression of mad volcanoes
a maniac of tremendous personality!
Certainly, friend! I am a deranged mind! Deranged!
This is my state!
The anguish he expresses in the poem below, written against the madness created by an authoritarian state, resonates perfectly today. Devkota's outburst is not just an expression of romantic over-sensitivity: it is a rebellion against a society out of kilter, where a shrewd, loquacious class keeps spinning webs to trap people and foil their bid to live freely.
DERANGED
Certainly, friend! I'm deranged!
Such is my state!
I see words, hear images, taste smells,
touch things that are slighter than the sky.
things whose existence no one admits to,
whose shape the world does not know
I see rocks as flowers
when by the river bank those slick, delicate, heavenly trick-
sters laugh
looking at me in the moonlight, unfolding in redolence, and
stand-
awakening, transforming, softening, swelling, shining, they
stand-
a kind of moon-bird's fruit like a mute mad flower!
I talk to them as they talk to me!
One language, friend! which isn't written, printed, spoken,
explained, told.
By the moonlit banks of the Ganges their tongues come in
waves,friend,
waves, waves!
Certainly, friend! I'm deranged!
Such is my state!
You are shrewd and loquacious! Your (a+b) class a2 + ab + b2
goes on and on
But in my arithmetic
if one is detracted from one, what remains is one
You work with the five senses, I with the sixth
You have brains, my friend! I have heart!
You can't see a rose as anything but a rose
I find it to be Padmini and Helen
You are powerful prose, I am fluid verse
You freeze when I melt
You become limpid when I grow turbid-
and also the opposite!
Your world is solid, mine vaporous
Your world is thick, mine thin
You take a rock as an object, solid: hardness is your reality
I try to hold onto dreams just as you hold onto
those cold, luscious coins with engraved letters
I have the ardour of thorns, friend! You of gold and coins
I have the tempo of thorns, friend! You of gold and diamonds
You deem the hills dumb, I deem them loquacious
Certainly, friend! My one inebriation lags behind
Such is my state!
Everyone called me erratic when they saw me warming myself
on the white, primary heat of the stars in the cold winter months
They said a ghost had entered me when I stared blankly for
seven days
after returning from the cremation pyres
They said I'd gone mad when they saw me cry for forty days
seeing a spray of forty-five year-old frost on a strand of your hair
They called me insane when they saw me dance to the first
cuckoo of Spring
When suffocated by a soundless new moon
I leaped at the pain of extinguishing
and the idiots placed me in stocks
I had just started to sing with the typhoons one day
and the learned people delivered me to an asylum
One day I had stretched out flat, thinking I had died
A friend pinched me and said-
'Oh madman! Your flesh isn't dead yet'
I have called the Nawab's alcohol blood, and the whore a
corpse
I have called the king poor, and have scolded Alexander
I have criticised the saints
and placed individuals of no import on the seventh realm of
praise
Your grand pundits are my idiots, your heaven my hell
Your gold is my iron
Friend! Your religious duty is my sin!
When you consider yourself intelligent I see you an imbecile
Your progress is my regression, friend!
Such turmoil in these bargains, friend!
Your cosmos is a child to me
Certainly, friend! I am moonstruck, utterly moonstruck!
This is my state!
I see the blind as the world's leaders! I see hermits in caves as
evaders!
I see those who stand atop false platforms to be dark dancers
I see the unsuccessful as successful, the ascetic as unsuc-
cessful
I see progress as stagnation,
Will I be pushed around, or will I be a councillor
Friend! I'm a councillor!
See the whorish jig of shameless leadership's bland tongue!
See the break in the back of people's rights!
See today's cracked crystals, selling as diamonds!
When the black lies of sparrow-sized headlines
call my brave reason to battle with deceitful enigmas
then-my cheeks flush hard, my friend!
My cheeks flush as red as glowing coals!
When the meek people imbibe black poison
through both their ears, before my eyes, saying it is nectar-
friend! My every hair stands on end!
My each hair twists, harried like snakes in the sky
when I see a tiger about to eat a deer, friend!
And the terrible power of the sage's soul
tries to enter my corroded bones and speak
Friend!
the day when a thunderbolt falls from heaven
when people do not consider people to be people
my jaws start to ache like mighty Bhimsen's jaws
and I turn the red balls of my enraged insane eyes
looking in a double as a bolt of flames upon
this human land of the inhuman-
My machine parts leap about
in uproar and agitation
My breath becomes a typhoon-
My face distorts
My brain lights up afire, friend!
like the fires submerged in the seas-
I become as mad as fires that consume entire forests
Insane, friend!
Like I might swallow the wide world raw!
Certainly, friend! I, stunning mythical moon-bird
hideous-soiled-soft-unkind bird
stealer of heaven's fire-
son of typhoons, an expression of mad volcanoes
a maniac of tremendous personality!
Certainly, friend! I am a deranged mind! Deranged!
This is my state!
I did not write this.....
Even after all this time
the sun never says
to the earth,
"You owe me."
Look what happens with a love like that,
It lights the whole sky.
Hafiz-a Persian poet in the 1300s
the sun never says
to the earth,
"You owe me."
Look what happens with a love like that,
It lights the whole sky.
Hafiz-a Persian poet in the 1300s
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