#bhakta

I kneel where Your tears have fallen,

Gaura, moon with reddened eyes,

and the sound of Your weeping

splits my chest open like a fault line.

Please—

do not cry like this.

Not because I do not love Your sorrow,

but because it burns too close to my bones.

Your grief enters me whole,

and I am too small to hold it.

When You sob for Krishna,

the world tilts.

Walls soften.

My breath forgets how to move.

How can a heart made of dust

survive the weight of God’s longing?

O Beloved,

I know these tears are jewels,

that the scriptures bow before them,

that liberation waits in their wake;

but I am only a devotee

with shaking hands.

Let me wipe Your cheeks.

Let me say the foolish thing love always says:

Please don’t cry,

not like this, not alone.

If You must weep,

then weep into my shoulder.

If separation claws at You,

let it claw through me first.

I would rather break

than watch You drown in holy grief.

Smile,

even if it is only for a breath.

Even if it costs me everything.

Your sadness is unbearable,

Bhakti-Prem-Love-Devotion: "In Sant Mat, great importance has been attached to Bhakti; it is the sine qua non of Sant Mat. If there are all other attributes but no Bhakti, then there is nothing. And he, who has no virtues but is endowed with Bhakti, is possessed of all. He alone is a devotee and he alone is dear to Bhagwant (Lord). Even if one performs Surat-Shabd Abhyas [inner Light and Sound Meditation], but is devoid of this attribute, then one is empty and hollow." (Discourses of Maharaj Saheb, Para 498) "Sant Mat does not countenance intimidation, bait, coercion or persuasion for attracting jivas [souls] to its fold. Bhakti (devotion) and Prem (love) of the true Supreme Being are engendered in their hearts just by delivering discourses on spiritual matters, thereby improving their understanding. By practising the devotional exercises, this Prem goes on increasing and the inner eye is opened." (Huzur Maharaj, Prem Patra Radhasoami Vol.4, Disc. 8, Para 91) "Remembrance of the Beloved is what is known as Prem [love]. Prem will dawn in the wake of remembrance. Where there is remembrance, the Beloved is Himself present there, and when He is present, remembrance of Him also abides. Since the Beloved is the Supreme Being Himself, His remembrance means that His holy feet have become implanted, as it were, in one’s heart." (Discourses of Maharaj Saheb, Para 656) "Even amidst their present backwardness and degraded conditions, the people of India still possess the virtues of 'love and devotion' acquired by them as a precious inheritance from the past, which no power in the world can deprive them of. India has always been the favourite land of Sants..." (Discourses of Babuji Maharaj Vol. 4, Disc. 30, Para 237)

When this highest ideal of love is reached, philosophy is thrown away; who will then care for it? Freedom, Salvation, Nirvana - all are thrown away; who cares to become free while in the enjoyment of divine love? “Lord[1], I do not want wealth, nor friends, nor beauty, nor learning, nor even freedom; let me be born again and again, and be Thou ever my Love. Be Thou ever and ever my Love.” “Who cares to become sugar?” says the Bhakta[2], “I want to taste sugar.” Who will then desire to become free and one with God? “I may know that I am He; yet will I take myself away from Him and become different, so that I may enjoy the Beloved.” That is what the Bhakta says. Love for love’s sake is his[3] highest enjoyment. Who will not be bound hand and foot a thousand times over to enjoy the Beloved? No Bhakta cares for anything except love, except to love and to be loved. His unworldly love is like the tide rushing up the river; this lover goes up the river against the current. The world calls him mad. I know one[4] whom the world used to call mad, and this was his answer: “My friends, the whole world is a lunatic asylum. Some are mad after worldly love, some after name, some after fame, some after money, some after salvation and going to heaven. In this big lunatic asylum I am also mad, I am mad after God. If you are mad after money, I am mad after God. You are mad; so am I. I think my madness is after all the best.” The true Bhakta’s love is this burning madness before which everything else vanishes for him. The whole universe is to him full of love and love alone; that is how it seems to the lover. So when a man[5] has this love in him, he becomes eternally blessed, eternally happy. This blessed madness of divine love alone can cure forever the disease of the world that is in us. With desire[6], selfishness has vanished. He has drawn near to God, he has thrown off all those vain desires of which he was full before.

We all have to begin as dualists in the religion of love. God is to us a separate Being, and we feel ourselves to be separate beings also. Love then comes in the middle, and man begins to approach God, and God also comes nearer and nearer to man. Man takes up all the various relationships of life, as father, as mother, as son, as friend, as master, as lover, and projects them on his Ideal of love, on his God. To him God exists as all these, and the last point of his progress is reached when he feels that he has become absolutely merged in the Object of his worship. We all begin with love for ourselves; and the unfair claims of the little self makes even love selfish. At last, however, comes the full blaze of light, in which this little self is seen to have become one with the Infinite. Man himself is transfigured in the presence of this Light of Love, and he realises at last the beautiful and inspiring truth that Love, the Lover, and the Beloved are One.

- Swami Vivekananda

Footnotes:

[1] Bhagavan/Bhagavati, Niranjana/Niranjani (Shiva/Shakti, Shiva/Durga, Shiva/Parvati, Shiva/Kali, Bhairava/Bhairavi, Shankara/Shankari, Maheshwara/Maheshwari), Narayana/Narayani, Brahma/Brahmani, Ram/Rama (Ram/Sita, Ram/Janaki), Kishore/Kishori (Krishna/Radha, Krishna/Krishna-priya), Father-in-heaven/Mother-in-heart, He/She, Him/Her, God-beyond-form/God-within-Form, Impersonal-God/Personal-God - a Manifestation/Experience of the Absolute based on one’s innate nature.

[2] A devotee - the one who truly loves Bhagavan[1].

[3] his/her, a devotee - applicable to all human beings.

[4] Bhagavan Shri Ramakrishna, also known as Shri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa - Guru of Swami Vivekananda.

[5] The word “man” is a figure of speech, and is applicable to all human beings.

[6] Desire to be with Bhagavan[1].

To Kali Maa — A Bhakta’s Whisper

O Dark Mother, you wear the skulls of time like pearls, your hands drip with endings, and still — I crawl to you.

You frighten me. You undo me. You bare my soul like a newborn, howling in your burning lap.

I came for peace. You gave me truth. I begged for mercy. You showed me my reflection — and it shattered.

But I stay. I stay because your wrath is not hatred, your blade does not kill the soul — it frees it. Your tongue is fire, yes — but it speaks my name.

Mother, I am not brave. I am only yours.

Break me, if you must. Burn away this ego, this pride, this shield. But never — never — leave me.

Let me weep at your feet. Let me dance in your storm. Let me call you cruel — and mean it — but never stop loving you.

I offer you the last thing I have: this ruined, yearning heart. Make of it a drum. And beat it, until only you remain.

(Author unknown)

Aphorism – 43 | Shandilya Bhakti Sutra-15 तदपरी शुद्धिश्चा गम्यालोकावलिङ्गेभ्य The unadulterated mood of devotion may be inferred from the natural outburst of a devotee Purport of Aphorism 43 Shri Shandilya in his previous aphorisms briefly discussed on the vastness and supremacy of Bhagawan over Jiva and Maya. He clarified that a devotee in his truest form is ever subservient to the Supreme…