27 April 2012

India in my Heart




(music: 'Madhur Suron', found on Ustad Alla Rakha's The Multifaceted Genius)

A flood of unforgettable memories and feelings for a love that runs deep within me, makes me want to share this small tribute with you here today ... and if I had to say it in one sentence, it would be this:

If Gaia, our precious Mother Earth, had a heart, it would be India

Be always watchful of Her infinite changing faces ... at times flowing mellow, easy-going and chilled, yet even more often  the fierce hot sun of Shiva-Kali in action - India is bursting, full to the brim with the 10,000 joys and sorrows of humanity. She will rip you apart and turn you inside out. 

Here I see genuineness wherever I look. The old and the poor especially move me to tears - we have so much to learn from those who never had or have lost everything of this world. They freely share the little they have, offering me, a stranger, their daily little joys with a completely open smile. Kindness, humour, and genuine interest in others transpire their lives and go hand in hand with silently endured hardship ... With what graceful lightness they tread this earth, with what patience and respect they labour the soil that nourishes them, their simplicity of ancient times always present in mind and deed. 

India needs no make-up, nothing is concealed, it all lies open in plain view for all who care to look. Man, woman, heaven, earth, beauty, ugliness, fear, hope, friendship, corruption, death, decay, everything and every soul a pure reflection of our times as they really are, whether I like to see the naked truth, or not. 

Yet if I keep looking without turning away in fear, I start to understand and accept that all this is part of a great magic, all part of nature; and I do what I feel is right and hold all beauty and horror as equally sacred in my heart, as part of the whole truth I am searching to understand. And when this happens, I find myself moving in perfect harmony in the moment, with a free spirit and suddenly beyond contradictions and opposites, beyond separation and judgement.

Mother India welcomes all who come to her, and I, having made my long way from far away strange Western lands, feel like going down on my knees in gratitude for finally having arrived home... home within, closer to myself.  And I take this with me on my life's unfolding journey, wherever it may take me. 

Namaste