O Bhagavan !
Chinta Dikshitulu
When You, the unseen Bhagavan, appear before me, I get perplexed, not knowing what I should do. I long to see You without a wink of the eye. I gaze at You with the deep desire to imprint Your Image on my heart. I see You when You are seated. When You stretch Your legs, mentally I place my head on Your Feet. I fix my gaze on Your Lotus-feet. I look at Your face and Your eyes. I see You majestically seated. I see You get up. I see You taking hold of the staff and the Kamandal handed to You by a devotee. As You proceed slowly walking, I see You. With a slow gait as You go towards the Arunagiri, I see You. I see You stop for a while, while climbing the Hill. Having stopped and turned round, I see You gracing devotees with Your merciful glance.
As one going into one’s own house, I see You go on the Arunadri; and make some enquiry of a devotee nearby. Climbing up and up the Hill, I see You disappear at the turning.
In ever so many ways and poses of beauty, in ever and ever so many ways I see You bestowing Your Grace on the devotees. I see You sitting and talking to them. I see You clearing their doubts, and I see You laugh. In all these forms I see You. I long to keep in my heart some one of these forms, to imprint it indelibly, and to bind it there so that it will not be lost. But why is it, O Bhagavan, that You vanish from my heart after staying but for a moment? Although I have seen You in all these forms, not one of them stays in my heart, why is it, Bhagavan?
That beauty of Yours in the majesty of being seated, that supreme serenity and grace in Your charming gaze while You 464recline Yourself on the pillow, that Lordship of Maheswara that marks the beauty of Your form while You are standing; that majesty, that self-awareness, that unharming love and beauty that is expressed by Your slow gait; that lion-like majesty, that mercy and condescension revealed in Your glance bestowed on the devotees while You turn back and look at them... why is it, O Bhagavan! that all these charming views and that of Your Presence I took in through my eyes to retain them within myself, all these are slipping away, on my return home, why is it so, Bhagavan? My heart is unfit for You to live in. True it is. It is true, O Bhagavan! that my heart is full of the shades of darkness; it is true there is impurity in it, that desires have taken their abode therein,it is true. It is true indeed that passions have built castles in it. It is really a crime for me to ask You to stay in my heart, in this wretched house. But where is the way to my salvation, O Bhagavan?
And then, do You say that if my heart is to be Your abode, it should be made fit for the purpose? Can I do it, O Bhagavan? Can’t You, O Bhagavan, dispel those shades of darkness with the Light of Your Form? Won’t You wipe out the impurity through Your mercy, O Bhagavan? Drive away my desires through Your glance, O Bhagavan! Make this house fit for You to live in, O Bhagavan! Arrange Your seat Yourself, O Bhagavan! Decorate the place Yourself, O Bhagavan! with the auspicious designs drawn on the floor. Set the light Yourself, O Bhagavan! All these things, O Bhagavan, I am incapable of doing for myself.
“But then give Me Your heart”, say You so, O Bhagavan? I do desire to give it to You. That You may be in it, I do desire to give it away to You. But it heeds not my word! I, as myself, cannot give it to You, O Bhagavan! Take it Yourself, O Bhagavan! and Yourself do live in it, O Bhagavan! But then, I recollect the verses which devotees have composed on You. I tally those descriptions with You, and with the aid of those expressions I 465take hold of Your Form and try to establish You in my heart. But You escape from those expressions. What to do, O Bhagavan? Those words cannot bind You, yes. The mind too cannot bind You. True. But where is that devotion in me that can bind You? Why won’t You bestow on me that devotion? “Earn it Yourself,” do You say so? But they say that everything can be got through Your Grace, that there is nothing impossible for You, that even malevolent destiny flees at Your sight, and why does not my destiny flee from me?
Live in my heart, O Bhagavan! That by itself will do for me, O Bhagavan! Won’t You, O Bhagavan! Won’t You?A