Amma

A couple of days ago, I found myself amongst thousands of fellow seekers seated in a hall overlooking the vast expanse of the city.

As She spoke you could almost feel a ripple in your heart, a warm familiar place you always seem to miss in your daily life,moving here and there, whilst involving yourself in all sorts of dramas. She laughed like a child and we all laughed like children, Her children, children of the Earth, children of the sky above, children of the universe, children of the divine.

She regailed us with sweet anecdotes on the most basic home truths some of which we all too often tend to forget. Then She embraced me, ahh if ever there were a moment when all else goes quiet, when all about you seems warm and tranquil that is it.

Amma ia called the 'Hugging Guru' and has hugged thousands upon thousands of people all across the planet. For that momentary embrace people have travelled continents, waited for hours and in doing so received something very rare in this day and age - a moment of pure unconditional love.

Amma's embrace is Her outpouring of love, the kind of love only a mother can give her cherished and beloved children. What makes Amma so special is Her ability to love each and every person who approaches Her with the same depth and intention.
Truly speaking, it is not just an embrace, it is an outpouring of grace, something deeply moving, an awakening of sorts, a churning of the heart which stays with you ready to be accessed at anytime...there is something special about you, inside yourself and you just know it.

To some Amma's embrace is just that - an embrace, but no embrace can be described as mere. Just the very act of giving someone a hug is powerful in itself, for it denotes welcome, acceptance, honour, respect, gratitude, love. One can take all these from Her embrace and yet more. Just the very act of a hug is beautiful and if we can spread that beauty around this world in which we live in we become a part of that beauty and make the world beautiful to live in.

To me Amma represents the gateway to the source of all things, the Divine Mother, the Shakti inherent in all things, animate and inanimate, the vibration of all love from which we all begin and end.

I still feel the depth of Her embrace and the words She whispered in my ear signifying Her unconditional Love and neverending Grace just like that of my own beloved Guru - Gurumayi Chidvilasananda.

Reflections in a Moonlit Garden

Ah how far your wings have flown, my love
far beyond the furtherest peak my eyes can see.
T'was only a wrinkle in time
you spent by my side.
Such magic, such magic.

Your perfume still lingers in this garden
you created in my heart,
amongst fragrant gardenias, rose bushes and
layers of jasmine circling the pond,
covered in lotuses crystal waters reflecting the silver glow
of the full moon, God's eye
winking at you, winking at me.

I see you now with my minds eye,
safe and warm in the arms of another love,
in a distant land, a distant garden,
asleep, at peace, lost in visions of
the winged ones, the fairy ones,
soft breaths of magic, a sprinkling of moondust
all across over your serene face.

Remember the first snowfall
that cold, dark winter's night.
Magic in your eyes,wonder in your sigh,
Your hands held mine,
lovers eternal in a moment;
ah how contradictory
the pen of playwright Destiny.

When echoes of your laugh rustle
among the leafy branches of my memory,
how then sweet one, could I let go
one such as you, one such a part of me.

Why bid me farewell, oh lover? You asked.
Why see me depart from your world,
Do I not leave you memories of pain,
torn shards of a heart, all too often broken?

I come not to stop you, or change your mind, I sighed.
My heart compels me to set you forth
on your own journey, your own path,
for love neither possesses nor hides
it frees as you are,
for now, for tomorrow, for evermore.

Your parting whisper of another tomorrow,
still resonates in my ear.
Maybe tomorrow, maybe not ever.
But my love this besotted one shall not forget,
the nectarian glow of that full moon
under which you dream of realms
no man has seen before,
that moon also lights up my reverie.
We glow in the same magic,
we glow with the same light,
Connected by moonbeams,
through space, through time,
We are not apart
ever..