CONVERSATION WITH THE MOTHER: Truly, I did set out for your temple today --- But then, I saw a little girl in the sea-light --- Measuring the sand with the hollow of a shell --- She played with the sun, shining it on the tide --- Her smile, it looped and looped round my soul --- I’m sorry, mother, I forgot about the temple --- Tomorrow I’ll go in, if you’re not on the shore.

SURYAKANTHI TRIPATHI

	WHAT MOTHER SAID TO ME		WHAT I SAID TO MOTHER
	I am touching you always, remember? With the light, and with the smile, With the wind, and with the glance With sunset, with shadow and darkness With the falling leaf and the distant hill Tell me, who has caressed you, ever, Who has caressed you that was not me? ****************************** Yes child, they are a stubborn pack, The horde of tendrils gnawing the mind. Would not go till you wrenched them out. They left you brittle, a metal of little shine, A useless alloy of many infirmities. So I will transmute you by fire, child Then, burn bright, burn your spirit bright. ****************************** When you are waiting at the doorstep Do you know who are you waiting for? Don’t you know that I entered Before you had shut the door, So that you do not wait alone? And, for you, I’ll come once again With me, when I arrive at your gate. ******************************* When you were lonely, sitting on the grass, Did I not rustle the trees with your fingers And sway the afternoon in a dance? Did I not swirl the clouds with your gaze To dapple that dance with light? Did I not become the ant on your sleeve, To watch nature’s ballet with you? ****************************** When you were sad about death and distance, For you, then, did I not summon time? Did I not round up space for you? Knead them together into a ball of dough Small and soft for the palm of your hand? And then did I not feed you myself With the fragrance of this new bread? ****************************** I did not leave you abandoned Even when you left thinking of me. The warmth of you is ever sheltered By the quilted strips of this mother’s soul. But she longs to be your infant too, Revealed in the heart of your longing And blanketed in the love of her child. ****************************** If you want to sing, I will be the lyric, If you caw, the blue of your black throat. If you want to listen, I will be the melody, If you whirl, then your slanting circle. I will be the rhythm of your song, I will be the truth of your chant, For we are sacred hymns to each other. ****************************** I am not hidden, was never in hiding, Curtailed by the stone of church or temple Waiting for an intrepid traveller to God. Is not my outrageous love known to you Bursting across walls and scriptures? I don’t need any desperation of your spirit. Why don’t you pause and feel my caress? ****************************** Why is your beautiful face tear-stained? What mute foreboding chills you? I am in your palm when you open your fist In the pause and pulse of your heart. You are perfect, the colour of my effulgence. For did I not distil me in conceiving you? Why is your beautiful face tear-stained? ******************************* You say that you knocked But that I did not hear. And then, you knocked again and loud? But where did you knock When there was no door, and no lock? Don’t we share the palace, you and I, A palace with no walls and open to the sky? ****************************** Reach me through another’s joy, Come to me as you hold up another. Know yourself as me, the world mother As ever extinct in me, thus eternal in me. For the waft of the incense can be you, And the oil in the lamp can be you, The lotus of a thousand petals can be you. ****************************** If you are willing, my child, to burn, I will fashion a lamp out of you. If you are willing, my child, to bleed I will shape a healer out of you. If you are willing to give up your all Then I will offer myself up to you. For it’s with your ache that I mould you. ******************************* Each morning you cover me with marigold, In the evening, with white buds of jasmine. You make my temple flower like a garden, And ask, why does mother not smile more. Gather for me blooms in the garden of pain, Garland me with thorns that you pluck, From the feet and the hearts of my children. ****************************** You ask what you should do with your life When what is bestowed to you is unique, And life is the opportunity only life can give. Use a moment, reverently, as a prayer, Each step of yours in step with mine. Expanding the shores of the inner ocean, And, out in the world, serving those that I do. ****************************** You ask me, “What can be your purpose, Trapping us in the vortex of life with death? Why wreck the world and promise rebirth, Even as the earth darkens with spilt blood? While I long to hear, each fragile moment, The birth cry of your limitless compassion, For beings that are and those that are dying? ******************************* Compassion is not parcelled in measures, Neat wedges for home and neighbour. Free it to touch all the earth and beyond, Give it wings, it will bring the sky home, Deny it your passion and kill it an orphan, Or be reborn, powered with that gift of sight, From which the mother cannot hide herself. ****************************** When you hear the silent call of another Suffer their sorrow and act as a salve, That, sun-like, is the true nursing of life. To judge what lives, is to judge how it loves, Love is finding the cosmic home on earth, To shackle the divine to you forever, Yes, it is love which will not let me hide. ****************************** Did I not compose you rich with experience, Replete with intelligence and desire? Abounding with life’s drama and tragedy, Elate you with success, harden you in failure? Would you still remain untested and untried? Or would you fulfil me in the shaping of you So that, in finding yourself, you travel to me? ******************************* I am terrifying, more than you can imagine, Seek to know me, to conquer your dread, Triumph over parting, over denial and death. Drink the vitality of creation and extinction So together we are drunk, mother and child, Make, erase and make again till perfection, So we can step and sway together, you and I. ****************************** Did I not conceive of time for you, To give reason for you to be and become? Seasons to change, to exult and be reborn? Did I not tame time to make him an ally? So that you may seek and find, lose and give, While in each span I held you in my embrace, So that you reach up and help others grow? ****************************** Why do seek to fathom me in stages? I am whole, and waiting whole for you. You are faultless, the pearl in my palm, So why do you swirl rosaries and rituals? Awaken to this one mind, one truth, I’m in your shadow, I’m in your light. I’m the plant that perfumes your night. ******************************* Why envy the tales and miracles of others, I am not shredded in balances and pans, I am here and there, infinite for everyone. On this side of the leaf and the other, On this side of the dawn and the other, This side of your skin and the inside, Smile at me, I am sitting next to you. ****************************** Between you and me, there’s nothing, child, Except for some screens placed by you. You closed the door, shut your eyes, Then describe me, instead of touching me. When you call me you make the distance, There is nothing simpler, no one closer to you, If you would see yourself, you would see me. ****************************** I am not in speculation, not in scripture, Not in tired argument or wise discussion, Pushing you from definition to dilemma By those who say they travel the path. I am your wanderer, pilgrim at the door, Child, I knocked, I’m waiting to enter I am holding the lantern, open your door. ******************************* Nothing you thought was gone is ever lost, The heard and the seen are a small trapdoor. In intuition, feel the essence assert itself. I am the changing and in me is the new, Even as I’m the ancient and the lasting. Nourish yourself in this vast spread, Feeding also this fare to others who suffer. ****************************** Accept death, child, letting go is not losing, Birth and death make stairs to immortality. Revel in your time and paint rich its texture, Released from the snarl of gain and measure. Bliss is the madness found in the songs Brought by you to the lips of others. Beat the drum, child, so that they may dance. ****************************** You asked me once and asked again And yet again, “Who are you?” You grow restless waiting for an answer. Do you first ask for a mother’s definition For then to make your pact to love her? Questions yearn only for their own release, Hear me instead in ancient, wordless verse. ******************************* My ardour was the primal energy With which the still darkness stirred Formless, I circled the unfathomed waters And founded truth in my constancy. Time began, light sprang from my desire And when all converged in my love, You, my child, came into being. ****************************** Hence, am I not also the dark mother, Who can obscure the world of desire? With darkness end this script of wants? To illumine the other stage within you. Peer in there, where there is intelligence. Peer in there, where I am waiting for you, This dark mother who forever resides in you. ****************************** The explosion conveyed from an instant To eternity, making speech an impediment. Who can describe us singly or united, When both are lost but sealed in one? Neither grand nor simple to each other. Only they that explain need to know, While those that feel need not. ******************************* Your mind is the boatman in the void, So rid your boat of the lumber of desire. Travel with your spirit as your mast. And, with compassion, arm your mind To handle the oars that grow heavy. And I will keep the faith to sail you Past these many seas of illusion. ****************************** Thousands of lives we have been together, I have been you and you have been me. Then smile at the moon hiding behind the clouds, Laugh with the rain outside my window. Why are your eyes dry, your hearing so parched, I need you, I’m more than mysterious certainty, I want you, mother, sitting beside me ever. ****************************** I, your child, am no stranger to you, But you, my mother, are yet unaware of me. So do not worship me from a remote fear, Do not worship me, do not worship me at all, Let me embrace you as your child seeking warmth. For my greatest need is you alone, So that I know you understand in whom I exist. ******************************** To go astray, just ask the address of the mother. Else embark on the only worthwhile journey That goes to ecstasy, into deep eternity Past all your forms after you left her womb Past all your halts after you left her womb To the speck inmost of you, with mother as guide Exult in travelling to her, with her as your guide. . ****************************** Make many friends, then watch ants climb a wall, Put the fallen fledgling back in the nest See the moonlight stroke the mountain, Hum because you are always in good company. The river of life is running deep and clear, The universe is bits of all we have put together. Every spot is a destination, the sky is in bloom. ****************************** You asked, how do I approach the mother, Is there a right and a wrong way? The dark lady, they said, will absorb all flaws. But correct one fault, your lack of ardour She who will quench your thirst, She only cares about giving you her love, In return for your flaws and your passion. ******************************** On the city streets was the everyday din Of man and metal, of laughter and wails So you climbed into the mountains To meditate in the silence of the slopes Let me nudge you, get back to the city, Mountains and meditation are taken care of, Go there and serve those that cry. ****************************** The scriptures are difficult and lofty, Loaded with symbol and hyperbole. But child, you know me to be simple and gentle. Even after you have given me a thousand names, You tense, you strain to reconcile me with me But child, you know me, you know me near, Your know me to be always, you know me near. ****************************** I see the dawn clinging to you, child, The ash of a dead fire not letting go of you. This entire universe wants your presence, As does the unwanted weed in the garden. I feel your need in the centre of my head, In the ripeness of a fruit felt with a fingertip, And in the anguished prayer for a sick child. **************************************		Mother, this morning I saw your red The sunrise had smeared on the east Mother, this morning I saw the crystals That the dew had borrowed from you, Your translucence was draped by the wind. And, Mother, I also saw, when night fell I saw the blue black veil of your great void. ****************************** Mother, what abundant seed you birthed This remarkable seed that sprouts desire! Takes root in fertile soil, in barren mind, Takes root in rocky ground, in prolific mind, And has countless young in an instant more. This desire is more fecund than earth itself, Mother, what a vehicle you made for desire! ****************************** Mother, you are my body, mind, my feeling The substance, the surface, my earth’s core You are my victory, my loss and my laughter Mother, you are my brother whom you killed And the breath of all my sisters living You are friend, lover, my million ancestors The brute of black regret that torments me. ****************************** I was sad when my father passed away, For he had been me outside of me. I was sad again when my brother died, For he had been me outside of me. Such sorrow, Mother, is beyond grieving. If you’re within me, did you take them there, Are they inside of me, in love as in memory? ****************************** Mother, why are you by my side, Ahead of me, or always following me? You know I have the world to attend to, Earn my livelihood, spend my life, Love myself and mine with sense and reason, Give me pure madness, mother, or leave me Don’t mix your madness with my sanity. ****************************** They say you're the syllable and the word, The sound of the said, sense of the unsaid, You're the resounding in the deep universe, The omnipotence not announcing itself. But, mother, become small for my comfort And whisper to me of me and of mine, Talk small, small mother, so that I understand. ****************************** Mother, I now sense the intoxication Of rafting on this inner river, My face damp with the spray of eternity. You are with me, mother, on my boat The river is rocky, the water is rough, So hold tight mother, we’ll get there surely For the journey is you, the destination is you. ****************************** God said he needs you, even God, mother! So searching for you, he came to me, And said you were his sustenance. Then He peered and saw you in my heart And has lodged there ever since God speaks sweetly, don't be too taken in, Remember, mother, I had spied you first. ****************************** I asked the Mother of the Universe Do you love me more than yourself? Are you like the earth mother That loves her child the most? And the Mother of the Universe said to me, Why do you seek to measure me as mother When I am the infant cradled in your arms? ****************************** When will you teach me to give, mother? I want no shadow of a speck to call mine Redeem me of all, my loss and my longing For only then can my soul discard my eyes. My soul is a slender, slight thing, mother! Stumbles on the smallest object in its path. When will you teach me to let go, my mother? ****************************** Have I already seen you, mother? Anonymous, among the hordes of everyday Which one of them was you, mother, which? Do not tell me, like some ancient text, That child, I, your mother, am each of them. For I want to see the real you, mother Or I want your eyes to see them all as you. ****************************** Mother, what are you doing here, within me? What is this flood in the inside of my inside Gushing into my throat, my tears and palms? What is this deluge that fills me with thirst? Is that you speaking to me, my mother? Why don’t you speak clearly to your child Not through cloudbursts that make me cry? ******************************* I began walking towards you, mother The path was steep, and I walked and walked. But you were nowhere, mother, it was desolate I lay down and looked at the city lights below. And suddenly, mother, the path began to move I sensed you, mother, as the path that travels, So I sat in your lap, and watched your face. ****************************** Truly, I did set out for your temple today But then, I saw a little girl in the sea-light. Measuring the sand with the hollow of a shell, She played with the sun, shining it on the tide Her smile, it looped and looped round my soul. I’m sorry, mother, I forgot about the temple Tomorrow I’ll go in, if you’re not on the shore. ****************************** Tonight, mother, you just cannot go away. The tumult is no more than a faded echo, Every atom glows, life’s in expectation The cord strains, the channel widens, And the centre flutters with faint breath. I’m getting ready to be born into your womb So you see, mother, tonight you cant go away. ******************************* Mother of a myriad rivers and oceans Give me a little of your water To slake the great thirst of the world. I heard the gurgling of the sacred flow, I found some shells and a fistful of sand. Let me stretch my arm to the sky And cup just a few drops in my hand. ****************************** Are you, mother, more than the womb? If you are more, then, what are you mother? Are you the urge of creation, fire of fertility? Are you the void that throbs itself into life? Are you the child conceived, before it will be? If you are more, then, what are you mother? Are you me, the child emerged before you? ****************************** You are a woman ever at the threshold, Neither appearing in full nor disappearing, If I could see a door at your threshold I would hold your hand and pull you in. But if your threshold is an unbroken wall Extend your hand and pull me through, mother Let us hold hands, please, across your border! ****************************** I respond to my name chosen by my parents, As they do to the names of their parents. But you, a woman of ten thousand names, You ignore all our calls by any of them. Which name, mother of all, pleases you best? Or are you waiting for a call without words? Do you wait, nameless, in a drop of longing? ****************************** Mother, you are the night beyond the mist, Your night, mother, must illuminate my being, By burning this blanket of birth and death. Great Mother of creation and extinction, The essence of desire and yet its liberator, Sever me from these amputations of time, And embrace me into your dark eternity. ****************************** Mother, is your time a regular, young fellow, Quite under your eye and tutelage? Do you know that he terrifies all of us? Is relentless, ever around, and has no mercy. Mother, if you love us, its time to rein him in, And tell him you’re more than eternal time, Mother, tell him you are pure compassion. ******************************* Time is always hungry, he frightens me He will devour all, greedy for dissolution But, gentle mother, they say you’ll devour time And remain as now, formless and unchanging, All form and change held in your womb. Woman without beginning, let me flee time, So open your arms and gather me in, mother. ****************************** Adore the sun, but adore the mother first For the splendours of all the suns Glimmer in the dark womb of my mother. Worship the water, but worship her first For the waters of the world find their flow From the clear womb of my mother. My mother is all that is and all that is not. ****************************** Revere the saint, but revere her first Since the piety of all the saints Poured from the nectar of her glance. Pray to Him, but see her holding Him, For did not He hear first her heartbeat Lying curled and unborn in her womb? My mother is all that is and all that is not. ******************************* Seek salvation, but seek the mother first, For salvation is not a distant country But a return to the womb of the mother. For she resides, moving and unmoving, Eternal in the unseen mind and cause Of the sun, the water, the sage and of Him, All derived from her form and force. ****************************** I really had so much to do, mother, And so I said I had no time for death. But he said he would wait for me, Because you had sent him to fetch me. Mother I was annoyed, I had so much to do, Till I found you were there in the boat, And promised to finish my tasks for me. ****************************** Mother, why did you send death to me, Asking him to collect me on your behalf? I ask you, why should I render to him ever Your spark in me that you had rendered me? Mother, I don’t approve of your role for death So, at my death the next time, mother, I will not hand me in to anyone but you. ******************************* Mother, I have sought for long to find you Riding on limping words and stunted thoughts. You, who are the woman of ceaseless creation, Don’t ignore me in the sheaf of your offspring. Watch over me, mother, with a smiling face. I am cold and weary with looking for you, And desire only the cloak of your warmth. ****************************** Use your sword of knowledge on me, mother, And shear from me small and tearful vanities. You who whirl the wheels of the cosmos, Tell me how I may be the arc of your arm, And make your ocean my workplace, mother. Use your blade, and cut me from bondage, Grant me the universe, mother, I need room. ****************************** I have found no hiding place from sorrow, No means of saving joy for tomorrow. And no longer hope to deny these reverses. So tell me, mother, how to win your favour? They say you contain all opposites in you, That only your darkness can absorb my grief, And only your light can grant me solace. ****************************** * Awaken me, mother, it is my birthright, You gave birth to me, said I would wake, So that I may give you your inheritance. Awaken me, mother, from the mist, This kernel that holds your awakening. Maker of many things, you have tarried long, Mother, do not remain sleeping inside me. ****************************** With chant, flowers and fruit, we bear tribute We know whom to adore with our oblation? To her to whom light and darkness run, To her to whom peace and storm run, To her to whom waters and seasons flow, In whom all the compass points converge, It is to her we offer today our devotion. ****************************** You give us a moment of exhilaration, In return for a long lifetime of confusion. Life’s confusion was entrancing, mother, The exhilaration was thus too, mother, For it was really you that made them so. But may I criticize your sense of time Where a lifespan balances an instant? ******************************* You made me, and then unabashed, You blew a great fog to hide you from me, Mother, fond player of hide-and-seek, I will not look for you in the city lights, Nor find you in the sparkling of a bonfire. Your darkness cannot escape the glow Of the solitary firefly in the night. ****************************** Why do they ask me for verses about you? Your music has a bigger orchestra than mine, You set the stars shining, the waters swirling, And make my forehead pulsate to your veins. Till I learn your metre and your melody, Till then, how do I write the sacred hymn To praise your free and formless infinity? ********************************** I bathe to wash the dirt off my body, I sweep the dust that the wind Blows into every corner of my house, And I rake the leaves fallen in the yard. But, mother, the dirt, the dust, the debris, They have piled high in my head, And I have not seen you do any cleaning yet. ******************************** If you are within me, then I am your temple And every time your feet are washed Joy courses as tears down my eyes. The temple bells ring, the lamp is lit for you, There is music, dance and the scent of sandal, Crowds of worshippers enter my heart. Mother of supreme divinity, do abide in me! ****************************** Mother, I made tea, come drink with me, My tea is perfect, right colour, right flavour. Don’t you worry mother, I do not forget, That you gave me the water and the leaf. But I made the tea, and I’m waiting, Mother, this waiting is almost as good, As it will be seeing you drink my tea. ****************************** Sip it, sip the tea slowly, mother, Don’t rush time into the future. I traversed far regions looking for you, And opened my door to find you home, My life has run its course now, When I watch you here with me. Sip slowly, and have another cup, mother. *************************************

	I CANNOT STOP TALKING TO HER		I CANNOT STOP TALKING TO HER
	How can I describe the form of you When your very presence erased me But in whom I still exist? How can I describe the form of one Who expanded me to reside within me? I touched you and sensed infinite space I saw you and I rebuffed mortality. ****************************** She made the universe out of herself, In a confluence of colours, shapes and dreams. In a myriad lives of effort and excellence, In matter, attribute, feeling and intelligence In illusion and reality, permanence and change. Empty me, and fill me up with you You are the key to my divine discontent. ****************************** My soul is a proud bird, come from mother, Belongs from the past, and into the future. It reads the ledger of earth, text of clouds, Hears the hymn of river, the speech of fire. My soul is lost in the temple within me, Crazed with her beauty and beloved of her, Gazing at her, waiting to be taken home. ****************************** It is late, mother, and I want to go home. You asked me to go out and play, And I have dallied much in your world, With playmates loitered long enough. I’m now weary, take me back home, For I now wish to be extinct in you, As foetus, in the womb of your irradiance. ****************************** I have seen things that you made visible Felt those tangible, and heard those audible But, mother, as one that lives in you Give me sight, mother, to behold your face, Be the universe, but I need you as a person. Let your breath be audible to my ears And tell me, mother, of that that is to be known. ****************************** Mother, I have decided to clean it up, The inside of me where you reside. Mother, help me unload the rubble Of desire and despair that clutter there. Mother, you deserve a bright fresh room, And I need just a little space near you, So that you can show me immortality. *************************************		What are the frightening voyages in the void? I can only try and cross a small river, mother, Please swallow the great void, it’s not for me. My mind will steer the boat on the river, Give me faith and kindness as masts, I am leaving all behind, the boat will be light, So sit with me, mother, and take me to you. ****************************** Mother, be kind to us, sweep away our misery. You are deft and wise, possess great magic. Mother of dark mystery, mother of swiftness. Mother who are self-born, of highest intuition, Why do you so delay in heeding our cries? Is it because you are laughing at us, mother, Who seek you with flattery rather than love? ****************************** Mother, I sought things and not you, Letting one desire go chasing after another? I became the hunted fleeing myself I became the hunter chasing myself. Not knowing when I turned my own tormentor? Show me you can be kind, mother, Show me the path out of these woods. ****************************** I did not turn my back, run away from pain, I suffered for mine and the other’s sorrow But I talked much and drowned what you said. Now to stay silent, lest I miss a word you say, Take my tongue, mother, sharpen my hearing. Tingling to your whisper a hairbreadth away. I will be silent, but mother, you be not so. ****************************** The lamp is lit mother, I can see, I am now ready for the journey. As I open the door, mother, reach out to me, This small seed of your energy and will. You are me contained in your creation, You are the creator carried by your child, The lamp is lit mother, now I can see. ****************************** You were, mother, when nothing was Then from the eternal night of non-existence, Night of no illusion, from pure consciousness You caused creation, and became the mother I give myself to you, to you as you did to us, How else do I serve your design, mother? Your ankle bell in a hut is the sound of salvation. **********************************