Sanch Sanch So Sanch #9

Yog Shukla, Bulleh Shah’s sayings are like dewdrops—fresh, new, tiny drops; yet the ocean is contained in them. And what kind of a drop would it be if the ocean were not contained in it! What kind of a saying is it that does not bring news of the wordless world! What kind of word is it in which the veena of the Unstruck does not play! So take Bulleh Shah’s expressions a little differently.

Bulleh Shah is no pundit, no priest—he is an ecstatic faqir. One who has known, who has lived, who has drunk—and who has poured for others too. If you only sit down to think, you will miss. These matters can be absorbed only in a state beyond thought.

banh akheen ate kann doven, goshe baith ke baat vichariye ji.
“Close both eyes and ears; sit in awareness and reflect.”

This is something to ponder. It is like Kabir’s paradox. Eyes and ears are the doors through which thought enters. It is by seeing and hearing, by hearing and reading, that a collection of thoughts piles up within us; layer upon layer of thought accumulates. Slowly mountains of thought arise—so vast that we forget our emptiness, we forget our own self. So much dust of thought gathers that we don’t even remember there once was a mirror of consciousness. We forget the very language of awareness. We are lost in a jungle of words. And these two—seeing and hearing—are the gates: either by listening or by seeing.

Bulleh Shah says: banh akheen ate kann doven. Close two things—eyes and ears. Bulleh Shah is a simple man, saying a simple thing. And meditation will bear fruit. Leave outside whatever you have gathered through the eyes. Forget what you have seen, so that the one who sees may be remembered. Let all that you have heard be erased, so that the spring of the Unheard begins to be audible. Our ears are crammed with outer noises. The outer racket is too much—only noise and more noise. And we are such fools that we go on hoarding that trash. People carefully preserve even useless things—things with no value, no use—and turn their inner world into a junkyard.

Leave outside what you have seen; it belongs outside, it is not yours. Let what you have heard also go out; that too is outer, not yours. Then for the first time a new light will arise in your experience—the light that is yours. Call it the seer, not the seen. Call it the hearer, not the heard.

Mahavira has said: basically there are two ferries that carry one to the far shore. One ferry is that of the shravaka and shravika—the listener, male or female. The other ferry is that of the practitioner—sadhu, sadhvi, sadhika. The Jaina monks defined it in such a way that people felt the sadhu’s path was superior to the shravaka’s. That is fundamentally wrong. Practice is needed only when, after hearing, understanding does not happen. Those who understand by hearing alone—why would they practice?

Buddha had a disciple, Vimalakirti. He never became a monk; he remained a householder, a shravaka. Yet Buddha often sent many of his other disciples to Vimalakirti: Go, and ask Vimalakirti. Naturally the monk-disciples felt offended. Their egos were hurt: We monks should go to a shravaka? One who has never practiced, no austerity, no effort—only heard the Buddha! We have not only heard, we have done—and we should go to him to understand? The shravaka always touches a monk’s feet. But Buddha sent his monks to touch Vimalakirti’s feet. Even on the way to Vimalakirti, people were afraid, because he would raise such questions, pluck such strings, that restlessness would be stirred. It became hard to answer him.

Vimalakirti was very ill. No disciple was willing to go. Sariputra was asked; he made excuses. Moggallayana was asked; he said he had other work, he was already engaged elsewhere. Only one disciple, Manjushri, agreed to go.

And when Manjushri returned, he at once said, Now I understand why the others did not go. It was winter, cold winds were blowing—but Vimalakirti made me break into a sweat. What a man he is—like a lion’s roar! And I had not asked any difficult question. I merely said: Vimalakirti, is your health all right? And that was enough! Vimalakirti at once sat up and said, Can health ever be unwell? Health means to be established in oneself. Illnesses can happen to the body, not to me. Hey fool! You don’t know even this yet! The body is born, grows young, grows old, dies. I am not born, I will not grow young or old, I will not die; I am eternal. What kind of questions are these? You come from the Buddha and ask such stupidities! I am always healthy. I have never moved a hair’s breadth away from myself. I am centered within. I have found my home. Let the body remain or go. What a question you asked! Take your words back.

And Manjushri had to take his words back.

This Vimalakirti was only a shravaka. Manjushri said: Since I am here, before I go let me ask one more thing. We are monks; we practice, we meditate, we do yoga. You are only a shravaka. You have only listened to the Buddha and never done anything. Why is it that we monks are sent to you to understand? And you are never told to go to any monk to understand?

Vimalakirti said: Monks come second. The one who understands by hearing is a shravaka. The one who does not understand by hearing—whose intelligence is not keen, a little dull—he is told to do.

Vimalakirti said: You must remember that the Buddha always speaks of four kinds of horses. One horse does not move even when beaten; beat him and he moves just a little. The second horse moves when the whip strikes, and then does not stop. The third horse does not even need to be struck; the crack of the whip is enough. And the fourth—those wondrous horses—do not need the whip’s strike, nor even its crack; the shadow of the whip is enough. They are the best.

Vimalakirti said: I understood by hearing; there was no question of doing.

But this hearing must be of another kind. The one who, on hearing, catches hold of words will become a scholar; if he clutches doctrines, he will gather information. But the one who, on hearing, catches hold of the emptiness—who, like one listening to music, becomes quiet while listening—only he will understand.

We have just two means. And in satsang both happen. One has to hear the master, and one has to see the master. The one who truly hears does not clutch the master’s words; he drinks the essence within the words and drops the words. The one who truly sees does not cling to the master’s body. Granted, the body is very dear and the words are very dear, but he connects with the invisible, the bodiless, hidden within the body. This connection is neither of eye nor ear. Such a connection is called satsang.

Bulleh Shah is right: banh akheen—close two things—and ate kann doven. Just two. And two are also symbols of duality, of twoness. Where there is duality there is thought, because where there is twoness there is conflict. Where there are two there is the question: this right or that right? And where duality is no more, there is thoughtlessness. So understand the second line more carefully—

banh akheen ate kann doven, goshe baith ke baat vichariye ji.

Bulleh Shah is speaking a paradox. He says: Whatever you saw with the eyes, leave it outside. Whatever you heard with the ears, do not grasp it. Close eyes and ears—and now, sit in awareness and think. Now you will not be able to think. Now thought is impossible. Thought requires duality; it is indispensable. And thought also requires a kind of stupor, a kind of unawareness. As dream requires sleep, thought requires unawareness. And when the eyes are closed, the ears are closed, and the inner lamp of awareness is lit—what thought then? That is what is called thoughtlessness. That is what is called nirvikalpa samadhi. In just such a moment the sky descends within you. In just such a moment the ocean is contained in the drop.

chhad khahishan jag jahan kooda, kahiya arfa da hiye dhariye ji.

Yog Shukla has translated: “Drop worldly desires, the world is false. Hold in your heart what the Brahma-jnani has said.”

I would make a small change, because the original is a little different. And the original is more valuable.

chhad khahishan jag jahan kooda.

He is not calling the world false; he calls it kooda—trash. Drop the desires of this world, the cravings, the lusts. Not because the world is false, but because it is trash. As you sweep your house every morning and throw the garbage out, in the same way, keep sweeping yourself every day. Do not let the garbage accumulate within. The mind is strange: it forms attachments even to garbage. It clutches at useless things.

The world is not false. The world is. If the world were false, walk through a wall—you will find out. You’ll go through the door. Try to go through the wall—your head will break. Drink poison, and you will die. Drink water, and if you are dying the breath will return. Do you think people like Bulleh Shah would eat pebbles and stones instead of fruits and sweets? That the food served on the plate would remain and they would eat the plate?

No, the world is real. The plate is plate, the food is food; stone is stone, fruit is fruit. This distinction must be made. But it is garbage—meaning, it has no value. Even if you gain it, nothing is gained; if you lose it, nothing is lost. It is valueless, price-less. And this makes a basic difference. If the world is valueless, where then is value? Where is the treasure? The treasure is within. Close the eyes and ears, hold awareness, and become master of that treasure.

kahiya arfa da hiye dhariye ji.

Shukla has translated: “Hold in your heart what the Brahma-jnani has said.”

Arif is better than Brahma-jnani. Arif simply means: one who knows. With Brahma-jnani complications begin. With Brahma-jnani you accept that the world is maya and Brahman is truth; that maya is to be renounced and truth to be grasped. Then Buddha would not fit, because he does not accept any Brahman; Mahavira would not fit, because he too does not accept any Brahman; I too would not fit, because I do not accept any Brahman. There is no personal God in the world. There is no Brahman sitting somewhere who made, runs, and destroys the world. Better to say “those who know.”

Arif means: those who have known. Then no boundary is created. Christ comes in, Zarathustra comes in, Mohammed comes in, Buddha, Mahavira, Lao Tzu, Socrates—all who have known. If you bring in the word Brahma-jnani, only Shankaracharya’s followers are left, because the rest do not talk of Brahman. That becomes narrow, small. Nagarjuna would not come in, because he says: there is no Brahman, all is shunya—emptiness. “Shunya-jnani” would be far better a word than Brahma-jnani—more vast. With Brahman, a boundary arises, a definition.

But even with shunya, though correct, a boundary still forms. Better to leave arif as arif—those who know. Why set limits? Why offer definitions? Why raise walls? Why fence a meadow? What those who know have said—hiye dhariye ji—hold it in your heart.

And the word hiye—heart—is worth remembering. Let it not go into the intellect; otherwise you have gone astray. Let it not go into the skull; then it will be of no use. Let it enter the heart; let it dye your feeling. Not your logic, your love. Not your thought, your emptiness. This is not intellectualism, this is mysticism.

chhad khahishan jag jahan kooda.
This world is garbage. Do not desire it. Do not hanker for it.

kahiya arifa da hiye dhariye ji.
And all who have known have said this. Hold their word in the heart.

pairi pehan janjeer bekhahishi di.
It is a lovely paradox: put at your feet the chain of desirelessness. What a thing to say! Chains belong to desire, to craving, to thirst. There is no chain of desirelessness. But you understand the language of chains, so Bulleh Shah speaks of a chain. You know nothing but chains; so, wear the chain of desirelessness—to please you: If you must wear a chain, fine, wear this one. Without a chain you are not content; you will wear something—then wear the chain of desirelessness. But is there any such chain? It is the same thing said again—goshe baith ke baat vichariye ji. Sit in awareness, close eyes and ears, and now think. What on earth will you think? Thought has no subject left; subjects come through eyes and ears. And wear the chain of desirelessness: desirelessness is freedom. To be without craving is to be free. Desire is the chain.

But since one has to speak your language, he says: You love chains, you have loved them for lifetimes; I too will tell you of a new chain—wear it. Once you wear it, you will know it was no chain at all—that you were tricked.

Pandit Lajja Shankar Jha asked two or three days ago: Why have you named this place an ashram? There is nothing here that looks like an ashram—no temple, no worship, no recitation, no yajna, no havan. People are not sitting reading Gita, Vedas, Upanishads. No gurus under trees with disciples fingering rosaries. There is nothing like an ashram here—so why call it an ashram?

Understand it just like Bulleh Shah’s—goshe baith ke baat vichariye ji. Be silent, close eyes and ears, awaken awareness—and now think. Or—pairi pehan janjeer bekhahishi di. Put on the chain of desirelessness. You understand the language of chains, so he speaks it. You understand the language of ashram, so I put up the signboard. If it were up to me, this is a tavern, a madhushala. But then it would be very hard for you to come. Even now people are frightened seeing the ashram sign, because the stories of the ecstasy of those who drink inside have begun to leak out.

To lure people like Pandit Lajja Shankar Jha, I wrote “ashram.” Like a fisherman baits the hook with dough, then sits with the line—fish won’t swallow the hook, they swallow the dough; swallowing the dough they swallow the hook. In the same way, Lajja Shankar Jha came thinking it is an ashram; now at least a little sprinkling will happen. He cannot go away exactly as he came, however much modesty he puts on, however deep a veil he draws. You see how Marwari women veil, and yet with two fingers they peek to see what’s going on! In just that way Lajja Shankar is peeking with two fingers: What is happening in this ashram? What is this affair? That much is enough. Ah, give me the slightest chink, the tiniest pore, and I will enter. Let some opportunity arise from somewhere.

Bulleh Shah is right:
pairi pehan janjeer bekhahishi di, is nafas nu qaid kar dariye ji.
Nafas means the moment, the breath—transience. This stream of time in which we live, in which we were born, through which we pass—this changes every moment. Do not get entangled in what keeps changing moment to moment, because beyond it is a realm of the eternal. Esa dhammo sanantano—this is the eternal law. One has to rise beyond this moment, beyond this time. One who lives only in the instant cannot truly live. What is there to live in a mere instant? Death is always knocking at the door. Who knows when it will come? It may come right now. It may already be standing here. There is no guarantee even of the next moment.

That is why, in our language, time is called kal, and death too is called kal. Ours is the only language in the world that gives the same word to time and to death—kal. And from kal we get our word for “yesterday/tomorrow”—kal. In this too our language is unique: we call the day gone by kal, and the day to come kal. Other languages have different words for what has passed and what is yet to come. We alone on earth give the same name to both—because our arifs, the knowers, saw that what is gone is not, and what is coming is not; both are not. Why give them different names? What is the point? The past has not “happened” now; the future has not yet happened; both are negations, both nonexistences. They share the same quality: neither is. What is, is this very moment.

And what will you do with this one instant? How will you live in it? The moment is too small to live in. For celebration, the eternal is needed. This courtyard is so tiny—if it were at least oblique we might dance—but this courtyard is so small: how will you dance? There is not even space to sit or rise. Forget dancing; there is not even room to stir. Move, and it is gone. As soon as you notice “this moment,” it slips from your hand. Not even the chance to shift. As soon as you say, Ah! This moment!—gone.

I was reading a little poem: “Spring has arrived.” The first line begins: “Spring has arrived.” The last line ends: “Spring has a—rrived.” Just splitting the word “arrived.” The same word at the start—arrived; at the end—a, rrived. That is how the moment is. It hasn’t even arrived before it is gone. You try to grasp it—it is gone. You merely become aware—this moment—has a, rrived! In such a tiny instant how will you live? How will you celebrate? How will you dance? Where is the scope? For celebration the eternal is needed.

So Bulleh Shah is right: conquer time. Imprison this breath. Rise beyond this kal.

ja jaan deven jaan roop tera, Bullah Shah eh khushi guzariye ji.
“If you let your life go, you will know your true form.”

There is only one condition: to know oneself, one must lose oneself. If a drop wants to know who it is, it must dive into the ocean. But the moment it dives, it is lost. Entering the ocean, it disappears. Yet only by losing itself will it find: I am the ocean.

Ego is the drop; we are the ocean. So long as we clutch the ego and say, “This is me—my caste, my religion, my country, my name, my address, my home, my lineage, my gotra,” we will remain astray. We will have no address of our own—because we have no caste, no lineage, no gotra. We were never born—how can there be caste? We were never born—what lineage, what gotra? How can we be Brahmin, Shudra, Vaishya, Kshatriya? How can we be Hindu, Muslim, Christian? We are pure consciousness.

But the boundaries of ego do not let us experience that vast consciousness. Curtains cover our eyes. Because of them, the tiny world inside the curtain is taken to be our all. Just lift the curtain a little...

Sometimes a tiny speck of dust enters the eye—a small irritant—and even if the majestic Himalaya stands before you in its vast beauty, the tiny speck hides it. Behind the veil of a speck of dust the vast Himalaya vanishes. The sky is studded with stars, but if a mote is in the eye, nothing is seen.

Our life has become gritty because of this small grit. Ego is a tiny grain of dust that has settled on our eye. Wipe it away. To wipe it, Bulleh Shah says:

ja jaan deven jaan roop tera.
Those who are ready to give up their life—that is, their ego—who are ready to dissolve, to become nothing, only they will know their own form. And those who have known their own form have known the form of the All, because the two are not different. When the drop knows its oceanic nature, it knows the nature of all drops.

ja jaan deven jaan roop tera, Bullah Shah eh khushi guzariye ji.
Bulleh Shah says: If you want to spend life in happiness, if you want to make life a celebration of joy, there is only one way—let the ego disappear. Ego is suffering; ego is hell. Apart from ego there is no suffering and no hell. And where ego is gone, the gates of heaven open. Those gates are within you. Heaven is your naturalness. Hell is your delusion. Hell is forgetting oneself; heaven is recognizing oneself.

Yog Shukla, this kafi of Bulleh Shah is lovely too. Whatever people like Bulleh Shah say is lovely.

Jagannath Mahto, there are deep chains around India’s feet. There are ancient layers of dust upon India’s eyes. India’s mind is enslaved. India’s soul is enslaved. India has lived on blind beliefs. And for such long centuries it has lived in superstition that whenever anyone has tried to break those superstitions, we have defended them with all our might.

Certainly, you are right that today the followers of Buddha in India are almost none. And even the few who are there have nothing to do with Buddha. They are followers of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar. What have they to do with Buddha?

And what had Ambedkar to do with Buddha? Ambedkar was purely a politician. What was his connection with religion? He chose Buddhism as a device to separate the Harijans—and especially the Mahars in Maharashtra; he himself was a Mahar and a Marathi—from the Hindus. And it is not that he had any special love for Buddhism. His life took many turns. Several times he thought of adopting Islam with all his people; several times he thought of embracing Christianity with them.

But perhaps many Mahars, many Harijans, would not have been willing to go that far. To become Muslim or Christian would have been a distant journey. Buddha does not seem that far. Whatever he may be—good or bad—the Hindus, after all, have accepted him as their tenth incarnation. He is an avatar, the Hindus said—albeit of a wrong sort, not quite proper; somewhat out of line, against the Vedas. But be that as it may, he is an avatar.

So to make Hindus into Muslims or Christians would have been a distant stop; very few would have agreed to go. Therefore, ultimately, for political strategy Ambedkar decided to become a Buddhist with his followers. It was a political act. It had nothing to do with Buddha. The few Buddhists you see today are followers of Babasaheb Ambedkar.

Your question is important, Jagannath Mahto: What happened? Buddha spoke continuously for forty to forty-two years, and the whole of Asia was influenced by Buddha, the whole of Asia stirred—except India!

Then either the fault lies with Buddha, or the fault lies with India. It cannot be Buddha’s fault. Yes—if you call this a fault, that he spoke the truth as it was. He spoke it straight, naked. He did not clothe it in the finery of Indian pedantry. And I say he did well not to. Whether India accepted it or not, Buddha on his part left nothing undone. The tireless effort with which he tried to awaken India—no one before him did that, and no one after him did.

And I tell you: to fail on the path of truth is a million times better than to succeed on the path of untruth. Even in Buddha’s so-called failure there is far more value than in the successes of Ram and Krishna. Buddha is the one truly rebellious man. If there is any salt in the life of India, it is because of Buddha; if there is any taste at all, it is because of Buddha. Otherwise India would be altogether tasteless.

Why could Buddha not be heard? There are many reasons. The first is India’s pandits and priests. Their net is ancient—ten thousand years old. And whenever a person like Buddha is born, the pandits and priests will stand against him. Because his blow begins to break their whole trade. Under his impact their idols start falling; their temples sink into the earth. Their scriptures are torn up. In his presence people begin to awaken and to see that the pandit is only a shopkeeper, a businessman, an exploiter. In his presence it becomes clear that the pandit only repeats stale things, parrot-like. Because in Buddha’s presence comparison becomes possible.

Pandits cannot forgive a man like Buddha. It is impossible. Their vested interests are against him. And nowhere in the world is there such a vast and ancient net of pandits and priests as here. It is India’s misfortune that the whole web has become so old that breaking it is difficult. It has entered our very fibers. Let someone say a word against the Vedas—immediately there’s a quarrel! You have neither seen the Vedas nor read them, nor have you anything to do with them. But the moment someone speaks against the Vedas, a fight begins. You are not willing even to listen.

Even today in India people go on saying that the Vedas are divine, created by God. It is astonishing. Educated people, cultured people, those teaching in universities, utter the same foolishness: that God composed the Vedas. Just flip the Vedas open anywhere and you will see clearly how God could not have written such things. Before each section of hymns the name of the rishi is given, indicating whose sutras these are. And from those sutras it is obvious they are man-made. A Brahmin is saying, “O Indra, this year let there be good rain on my fields. I will give plenty of offerings and fees, I will perform sacrifices. I will make you drink soma to your fill.”

Just think—would God write this? God’s fields? “Let there be good rain on my field”—this can only be a human voice. It’s so obvious even a child needs no explanation. And it doesn’t end there: “Let there be more rain on my fields, and none on the neighbor’s; then I will heap rich offerings.” Now the matter has worsened. This is no longer merely human; it has become inhuman. “Let the milk in the udders of my cows increase, and let the milk in my neighbor’s cows go dry.” Would God say this? Who is God’s neighbor? All cows belong to him. All land is the Lord’s—whose is mine and whose is yours? Does the language of mine-and-yours run even there?

Buddha said exactly this: the Vedas are not divine scriptures. No scripture is divine. All scriptures are composed by men. And there are many kinds of men. Some were knowers—those who had seen. Perhaps there you might hear a distant echo of truth. But those who pray for more milk in their cows’ udders cannot be knowers. Those who pray for rain on their field and none on the neighbor’s cannot be knowers. Bulleh Shah would not make such a prayer. Kabir would not. Buddha would not.

Buddha told his disciples: when you meditate, and in meditation when you become blissful, always conclude your meditation with this: whatever joy has come to me through meditation, may it be shared among all beings—unconditionally among all beings; may it not remain mine. For what remains “mine” will die. What is shared will be saved. Sharing makes it grow; hoarding makes it shrink.

Once a man came to Buddha and said, “If you say so, I will do it. I ask only this much permission: my neighbor is very wicked—leaving him aside I can say, may my meditative joy go to all. Let it go to the whole world—to animals, birds, plants, mountains, whomever you say—but I cannot say that it should go to that wretch. Give me leave to exclude just him.”

Buddha said, “Excluding him will spoil everything. For it is that very mind I want to change—the mind that thinks in the language of friend and foe, of one’s own and the other’s, of I and you. Let that neighbor be the first to receive it; then let it go to everyone. Do your meditation thus: when joy arises, say, first let it go to my neighbor, then to all. The neighbor should indeed be first. He is the neighbor; when the stream of your joy flows from you, it will touch him first, then others, then the far-off moon and stars. And you say he should not receive it at all! Then how will the stream flow? A rock will be placed right at the source.”

What is said in the Vedas are human desires, human cravings. Buddha said the Vedas are human-made—and made by very ordinary men, whose utterances are not of great significance. Here and there, by mistake, a sutra appears in the Vedas that is worthy of praise—one percent, not more. Ninety-nine percent is rubbish.

The moment this was heard, the pandits were enraged. And the entire apparatus of the pandits, which had encompassed the whole world, declared a jihad against Buddha. Hence Buddha could not be heard. Perhaps I too will not be heard. I will try; I am trying.

But I am not much concerned about it, and don’t imagine Buddha was overly concerned either. Those who can hear will hear. Those for whom it is meant will receive it. Those who have a little intelligence will drink it in. And what can be done for fools! Whether Indian or non-Indian, a fool is a fool. And in this country there is a long tradition, a long chain, of fools.

India has all but forgotten how to die. And since it forgot how to die, corpses remained. Since it forgot how to die, it also forgot how to be reborn. The old should die so the young can live. In this country the old are alive; therefore children cannot be born—or if they are, they are born old.

Further, India pretends to be theistic, but in truth it is not; it is atheistic. Because your whole religion stands on negation. Renounce this, renounce that—this is negation. The world is false, maya—renounce! House and home are maya—renounce! Escape! This escapism is negation. And where there is negation, there is atheism. So our theism is a borrowed Ram-name shawl. Inside something else is going on; outside we are cloaked in something else.

Buddha snatched away our shawl and said: first look at your reality, for only in reality can revolution happen. First understand the truth of your life; only then can there be a revolution in your life. If that truth is not seen, you will remain hollow theists; deep down you will remain atheists.

Before one can be a true theist, one must pass through the fire of atheism. One who has not learned to say No—what Yes will he ever say? His Yes will have no power. His Yes will be impotent. Buddha taught the passage through atheism. Instead of learning his lesson, India declared him an atheist.

I tell you the same: first, be an atheist. With the sword of atheism cut down all blind beliefs, all hypocrisies. Drop every chain. Dispel all darkness. And when through atheism you have done all the cleansing, then sow the seeds of flowers. The blossoms that come will be of theism. As when one makes a garden, one first removes stones, digs the soil, pulls out roots and weeds—that is the work of atheism. Then one sows the seed. Then flowers come; spring arrives.

What grievance against one who never loved?
He who forgets his pledges—when was he ever faithful?
He has always worshiped the fireflies in flight;
When was he ever a devotee of moon and stars?
We drowned in the whirl of wakeful nights;
When was his hand ever an oar for us?
Yes, they cuckoo beyond the lovely season of mangoes too,
But when was this ever a cuckoo’s true character?
If I call out, may my voice touch another—
When was he ever weary of this hide-and-seek?
Famed in the world, says “Qateel,” are their flights;
When were they ever captive in the snare of love?

You are right to ask: will only foreigners understand my words?
I make no distinction between homeland and abroad. Whoever is thirsty will understand.

Yes, they cuckoo beyond the lovely season of mangoes too,
But when was this ever a cuckoo’s true character?
If I call out, may my voice touch another—
I am calling out; whomever it can touch, it will touch.

If I call out, may my voice touch another—
When was he ever weary of this hide-and-seek?

This India has been living in superstitions for ages. It has long ceased to seek truth. I will call; I will give the voice—I am giving it; but only those will hear who are willing to listen. Do at least this much: keep the door open.

At least you listen, Jagannath Mahto! Forget worrying about others. For you have other questions too. From them it is evident that you are not hearing either. Those other questions prove that this question you have asked concerns you yourself; you have merely taken the name of “Indians.”

A heart, by the severity of pain, bloodied and torn,
Roams this city—a wild, wandering one.
Is he a poet, or a lover,
A yogi, or a wayfaring gypsy?
Keep the door open!

A cloud rises from the chest, and from the eyes a shower falls;
Not the spring cloud that rains for four brief hours;
This is the monsoon of Bhadon—when it rains, it pours.
Keep the door open!

In his eyes there is a whole realm, a whole world;
But seals upon the lips—he must not speak it out.
What is it he has lost,
What has he set out to find?
Keep the door open!

Yes—if you can, hold fast to the cord of love;
Your beloved is your beloved—what theft is there now from you?
The one whose proclamation this is stands in your own street, fair one.
Keep the door open!

Keep your complaints gathered up, your eyes spread like a carpet;
Keep a lamp lit upon the window’s threshold.
Let it not turn back disappointed; yes, keep the wager of faithfulness at hand.
Keep the door open!
Keep the door open!!

That is enough for today.