Even a Leaf: Another Chapter

Namaste Friends

A little note to begin with

Last January I published a post inspired by a favourite verse from the Bhagavad Gita:

If anyone with love and devotion offers me a leaf, a flower, a fruit, or water, I will accept it.                                                        Bhagavad Gita 9:26

If you like you can read the post here, but I will be including the poem that made up that post in this one which shares the same topic,

Today’s post was in fact written during my more recent hospital stay as a record of a very nice encounter with my Bhagavad Gita and a nurse. I’ll only make changes to tidy it up a bit and to make it clearer for you, the reader.

A ministering angel, in the guise of a nurse happened to notice my beloved little Bhagavad Gita sitting on my bed-side cupboard as she went about her healing duties. Picking it up, pausing to gaze at the image of the Lord on the cover, she then exclaimed excitedly:

‘You love Krishna!’ She was already opening and closing my book at random, with a rapt expression on her face.

‘I do love Krishna,’ I replied, happy to connect with a fellow devotee.

‘O my God,’ she cried even more excitedly, ‘you even have leaf. She held up one of the small leaves I’d slipped between the pages. It was as if she was making of it an offering, just as I had when first putting it there, in remembrance of that verse I love.

I think there are at least half a dozen such leaves offered at various times over the years.

Gently, reverently, she put the leaf back in its pages, closed the book carefully, and replaced it in the exact same position on the bed-side table.

‘I am very glad you love Krishna,’ she smiled as she tuned to leave and headed to serve the next one in need of healing.

love and peace

Paul the Hermit

PS

The poem from last January’s post:

Cries of the Winged Ones

CRIES OF THE WINGED ONES

Just let go
cries the winged messenger
perched in the fence-corner tree.
Let go. Just surrender.
Surrender to what?
The river of life,
its flow, its vibe

Lord here I am,
I cry in reply.
Two beings, one Self.

The winged messenger cries

because she longs for us to listen

The Word is the Word

OM IS THE WORD
Om
In the beginning was the Word
Om
And the Word was with God
Om
And the Word was God
Om
And the Word is God
Om Om Om

Om
The object is the Word
Om
The subject is the Word
Om

Om
The observed is the Word
Om
The observer is th Word
Om

Om
The Word is the Word
Om
There is only the Word
Om
It is as it is – the Word
Om Om Om

A Prayerful Poetics, A Poetic Prayer

Just about to open my tablet to retrieve an email I’d sent myself a day or two ago with a prayer attached that I’d found in a book.

But I stopped: I felt, no, no need to transcribe that prayer; I sense some words of my own that are struggling to emerge (actually paraphrasing a very vague sense and direction here; I rarely think – or speak – in such a formal way). So, I left my tablet and reached for my notebook instead

So, what emerged? Well, it’s a prayer and it’s a poem. It’s a prayer or a poem, Either or, and both. In any case, here is the first draft – I only got these words down on paper a half hour ago.

Words from my heart to my heart. A prayer to my Self, a prayer to all that is. And it’s a poem too, remember!
So, now I share this prayer (or poem?) with you.

I am, you are, we are.

Thou art that

MY LORD, WHAT SHALL BE MY PRAYER?

My Lord, what shall be my prayer?
Oh, where even to begin.

There are painful fragments from the past,
fear-fuelled fantasies of the future.
None of them real. None of them mine.
The mind only controls.
Yet clinging to them haunts me.

I aspire to monkhood, to the hermit life.
Yet to desires of many kinds I am attached.

I long to be absorbed in Bhakti;
I long to worship, to praise, and to celebrate All
Ceaseless prayer I aspire to,
to be absorbed in communion.
Yet again the ego-mind
fills me with reason’s illusions
and endless words of the world.
I am barricaded, from You.

I strive to remember who I am;
to recall who You are.
Within the words of this prayer lies that memory:
I am. You are.
Thou Art That.