MIDNIGHT PRAYERS

When all gates are closed
and no more duty calls,
and no other voices
try to speak to you,
then pray, o soul,
as if they were
the final words to say.

With no one left to turn to,
and no one there to listen
but You, o Lord,
who knows me since eternity.

Will You allow me
to carve some words
out of my feelings,
my desperation,
my joy, my yearning?

No thought unknown to You,
no deed unnoticed.
You watch, permit,
inspire and forbid.
Who am I to speak to You?

And yet,
to whom else shall I speak
if not You, Self of the self,
Soul of the soul?

Without You there is no me.
And I ask You
at this lonely hour:
who am I
beneath all covers,
beyond all borders
of this fleeting world?

Who is that me
so close to You,
and yet so far away?

How many births must pass,
how many creations,
to meet at last that single jīva
singing Your names,
praising your grace, Your beauty?

Countless souls take birth
and vanish once again
not having heard Your name,
not having sung Your glories.

Here I sit and wonder
what has been at work
that carried me away
from Māyā’s tightening grip
into Your kind embrace.

O Kṛṣṇa, o mysterious Lord!
Please reveal to me
how I may worship You.

Amongst stars and galaxies
a single planet travels
following its given course.

Countless jīvas move about
following their given course.

From where they came,
and where they’ll go
only You know, o Lord.
Only You know why.

We are blind
to past and future,
and we see so little of the now.

Listen to Me, You say,
I will guide you safely
through prakṛti’s endless maze.
No one knows where it begins,
no one where it ends
but Me.

O compassionate Lord!
Will You guide my steps,
curb my restless mind?

O Lord, I follow You.

If kindness is shown,
it is You reminding me
to be forgiving.

If anger is cast
it is You reminding me
to extinguish the flames
of desire.

If praise is spoken
it is You reminding me
how small I am.

If happiness shines
it is You reminding me
to be grateful and meek.

If sorrow throws its shadows
it is You reminding me
to search for the truth.

Nothing has substance
if it isn’t pointing at You.

O Prāṇanāth’, Lord of life!

There is no life without You,
not even death.
Only emptiness
filled with meaningless things.

Hours are passing,
take us along,
don’t say where they’ll lead us.
Time doesn’t ask for permission.
Time rules.
And we are to follow.

But there is more:
our choices.

That’s why You teach, o Lord.
That’s why You descend
into this sorrowful world.
That’s why You send
Your own servants, Your devotees.

You care millions of times more
than anyone else.
You love millions of times more
than I can possibly fathom.
And yet,
my choice is still weak,
the knot in my heart still tight.

Everything depends on You, o Kṛṣṇa,
like pearls strung on a thread.
We look at them,
admire their beauty.
No one thinks of the thread
holding them all together.

Not knowing You
is worse than a nightmare, o Kṛṣṇa.
The world keeps us busy
running after scattered pearls,
never lets us find the thread
to string them together.

How strange
that we put our faith into appearances
while we ignore
the invisible foundations beneath.

Not knowing the world
that’s apart from You
is a rare blessing
nobody prays for.
It is a hidden secret.

Takes a long time to grasp
and courage.

Into the silence
of this starlit night
I place my prayer
framed in helpless words.

May it reach You
this very moment,
or in a million years,
whenever, somewhere,

while I live on
in comforting certainty
that I have disclosed
my innermost self to You.

And to know
that You know me
is the greatest happiness.

Nothing will be forgotten
unless it’s forgiven.

How to forgive
when thoughts of injustice
and hurt feelings
torture the mind,
seem to eat away one’s heart?

Easily I say I forgive
just to find peace,
or create good impressions.

But memories linger on,
surface all of a sudden
questioning my so called forgiveness.

This must be You, o Lord,
dismantling the mask
so cleverly carved and painted.
For only love can forgive,
and I still don’t understand.

Please instill me
with a tiny fragment of Your prema,
so I may forgive freely
and forget forever.

Cold clean air,
a few lost snowflakes.
Down in the village
some windows still lit.
Darkness of a winter’s night.

If you can’t sleep
stay awake and pray.

Pray for all of us souls
cast into flesh and bones
lost in false identities,
passing through childhood,
adolescence and old age,
ignorant of the self
that never dies.

If you can’t sleep
pray that you may be carried safely
into the coming day.
Who knows what sunrise will bring?

Danger at every step.
Life and death are nebulous.
It’s a strange world.
Leave it!
Surrender.

O Kṛṣṇa,
voices all around,
images of the past
flicker in my mind,
faces stare at me
and disappear.

I see highways,
cars and trucks speeding along,
airplanes taking off and landing,
crowded cities, lights flashing,
drunken people yelling, beating.
Beggars, murderers.
War cries, rivers of blood,
slaughterhouses, torture camps.
Forests burning to ashes,
storms tormenting the sea.
The night is quiet.
Lights are turned off.
Only loud snoring of my neighbor
in the apartment above.

O Kṛṣṇa,
am I awake or asleep?
What is real,
and what is unreal?
What will I see
when You show me the truth,
the Absolute Truth?

My prayer is a simple one.
But how should I express?

I still fear to be looking
after my own gains and losses
when I beg You for sevā –
something to do that pleases You,
when I beg You for saṅga –
to be with those who worship You.

Anything else
isn’t really worthwhile a prayer.
For all the wishes fulfilled
must still call for more.

But do I really mean it
from the bottom of my heart?
Purity isn’t so cheap.
Must be earned little by little.

Words say little
if not followed by action,
if not proven by time.

As I struggle
to find these words
I begin to doubt
whether You approve of them.
Better to remain silent
and let action speak for itself.

But then,
who would like a friend
that stays mute all the time?

Thus I live on
to attain friendship with You
one day,
when You deem me worthy,
when my prayer has been proven
by deeds, by surrender.
ātmā nivedana

I take refuge
in the impenetrable darkness
of this cloud laden night
bereft of shades and shadows,
for even in the most frightening
blindness this world has to endure,
nothing can cover Your light, o Kṛṣṇa,
that shines brighter than all stars
and moons and suns together.

And no night can be too dark
to cover that spark of Yours,
that tiny fragment, called the soul.

The colorful glitter,
the voices of the day,
easily make me forget
who I am
and to whom I belong.

After nightfall has come,
and all lights and voices
have been switched off,
I know better than ever
that I am Yours.

The agents of Māyā,
trying to catch the innumerable jīvas
traversing this world,
never stand still, never give up.

Looks like a battle
that’s already lost.
What about our chances?
How much strength do we have?
Most of us don’t even know
what that struggle is all about.

What we call victory
out there in the external
could be a gruesome defeat
once you realize
what’s truly at stake.
For even if you win the whole world,
the soul is still in a cage
and doesn’t know how to get out.

O Kṛṣṇa,
path maker of Your devotees!

You assure guidance
to those willing to listen,
to those turning away
from the ego’s dictations.

The forest is on fire.
The flames are blazing.
Quickly tell me
where to put my next step!

You are hiding the path,
yet You lead me on,
and I have no choice
but to trust You, o mystical Lord.

That is Your blessing.
What more is there to ask for
when You have already
taken me to Your side?

No return to desires.
All bridges broken.
Only sparkling in the distance,
too far away to reach now.

Outside my window
a solid mass of black,
too scary to look at
for a long time.

That’s what it must be like
not having the slightest idea
of who You are, o Kṛṣṇa,
and how You exist.

The sun
never parts from its rays.
The sun
doesn’t know darkness,
and yet causes it,
without ill intention,
just by its absence.

The jīva’s darkness
isn’t Your fault, o Lord.
It happens by absence,
absence of wisdom,
of love.

Will You ever allow me
into Your innermost realm
where awe and majesty
lose all attraction, all glory,
and no one sees You as God?

How long is that road,
how impossible the task!
How daring to beg
for that blessing!

Like a child
wanting to touch the moon,
I wish for no other destination,
though out of reach
from where I stand now.

O Govinda,
this is my plight.

Innumerable living beings
named ātmās, souls, jīvas,
or whatever …
They are all Yours, o Lord,
o Parameśvara.

How many take refuge in You?
How many know?

This is the world of forgetfulness.
Causeless ignorance
without a beginning.

You are equal to all.
But to some
You become partial,
for some
You make an exception.

I bow down,
bow down to You.

Voices of the night
keep speaking to me,
try to flood me with fear.
It happens so easily
if one lends them an ear.
What isn’t frightening
in our fleeting existence
where everything must end
in destruction and death?

How strange
that we fear over things
destined to vanish
while ignoring
what could be ours forever.

There is a bond
between You and me,
and I pray, o Lord,
that it will grow stronger
day after day,
that it may be guarded
no matter who lures me away
out there in the darkest of nights.

The hour is late.
I am just about
to lay down
this mortal frame of mine,
this intricate machine
running on given time.

Let this body be Yours,
o Kṛṣṇa.
Though it has seen its days
and is slowly falling apart
it might still be of use
if You so wish.

For sevā.

Who sees the future,
the bottomless past,
and even the present
as You do, o Kṛṣṇa?

All of them come and go.
No one knows where, but You.
You are always with us –
behind, above, left, right.

Still,
to actually see You
is a most rare sight
granted to a few
not of this world.

Here
we are walking in circles,
don’t know how to stop,
how to break through
until we get to see You
somewhere, everywhere,
by the grace of those
who have seen.

To see the Truth-
To be seen by the Truth.

Tomorrow is far away.
Hours in between.
Countless thoughts pass
till tomorrow.
About what?

Think about Me,
You said to Arjun’,
Your dear friend.

Thus I pray,
please make me think,
think deeply
about You.

If we belong somewhere else,
then why aren’t we there?

If we came from somewhere else,
then why have we left?

And if we are meant
to go somewhere else,
why do we doubt, disbelieve?

The answers can’t be found
in the marketplace of opinions.
The biggest libraries may fail
to tell us for certain.

We have no choice
but to go further, deeper inside.

Perhaps
when all is quiet,
and all others are sound asleep,
it may dawn on us slowly
in bits and pieces,
so we may finally be prepared
to embrace
what we have ignored all along:

Your voice,
o Lord in the heart.

You are Īśvara,
You witness, You sanction,
You sustain, You protect.
Not a single atom
exists without You.

And yet
we walk in forgetfulness,
confuse real with unreal,
love with lust,
the ego with the self.

This, too, is Your śakti,
Māyā’s curtain
that veils us all
till we surrender.

There is no other shelter.
They all fail
in front of the Truth,
Your splendour.

I pray
that one day
I may be deemed worthy
to face that Truth
not plain or naked,
not frightening or void

but dressed
in simple garments
of a cowherd in Vraj’
carrying a stick and a flute,
wearing a garland
of forest flowers
strung with the purest of love.

I pray
that one day
I may be deemed worthy
to face that Truth
all pervading,
and yet so hidden,
the oldest,
and yet of blooming youth

walking barefoot
along Yamunā’s sandy shore
laughing and playing
with His friends
hide and seek,
marking the earth
with His own signs

thunderbolt, cakra,
the flag and the fish.

I pray
that one day
I may be deemed worthy
to face that Truth
more radiant
than a million suns
more cooling
than a million moons

seated on a golden throne
with His beloved Rādhā
delightfully served
by Her sakhīs.
Only the night
as the silent witness,
Yamunā’s cooling breeze,
fragrance of the blue lotus.

Who am I?
No other question
stirs so many answers.
No other question
is as clear and nebolous
all at once.

There is always more to come,
another identity behind another
and yet another,
for what have we not been
on our journey
through life and death?

By good luck, or by grace
one may at last come to say:
I am conscious, I am a soul,
I am eternal.
And yet, what does it mean?

It means belonging.
Belonging to You, o Lord.
Being Your servant.

Thus I ask You:
who am I,
as a soul,
as Yours,
as me?

Words cannot say it.
My prayer is left unspoken.

Here,
words and feelings
must leave one another.

Only You,
o Lord in the heart,
Soul of the soul,
see where I stand,
where I am lost.

When beauty and ugliness
begin to look all the same,
when the senses seem to find
no more attractions outside,
when one has lost confidence
in the mind’s pointless ideas,
when all one’s plans and hopes
turn out empty and frail,
when life itself is in question
and the fire of one’s being
is slowly fading away,
when darkness starts to cover one
from all sides,

will You send someone
to come to his rescue,
o Dīnabandhu,
compassionate Lord?

Just a few minutes
past midnight.
Sleep refuses to take me
on its voyage
through dreams and nothingness.

I am left behind
with the remnants of a day
that has past forever.
Everything could have changed.
But it didn’t.

I am working
under Your protection.
And You are Acyuta,
infallible.

Ignorance
is like a disease
that can’t be cured
unless one admits
one’s own stupidity.

How painful!

After all those lessons
the world has taught us,
after all the experiences,
all that we have seen and heard,
we are still confronted
with questions unanswered.

Ignorance means
not having asked our questions.
Wisdom means
having found the answers.
Both are given to us
at a time beyond control.

It is grace,
divine grace.
Your presence.

O Kṛṣṇa,
ignorance simply means
not to trust You.

From that
all else follows,
the whole chain of absorption
into the external.

And there is always more
to come.
saṁsāra

To some rare jīvas
You grant the vision
of what the future will hold.

Some are allowed to see
who they have been
in their previous lives.

And some You empower
to master great tasks
in the here and now.

I pray
to become a servant
of Your servants
forever.

Are You pleased, o Lord,
if I go on lamenting
over my many faults,
my mind’s straying away
from remembering You?

Perhaps You are pleased
that, at least, I try.
But trying isn’t enough
if one doesn’t go further
leaving behind the unwanted.

Obstacles appear suddenly
like sent from a secret place,
bent on making one fearful,
uncertain about one’s resolve
to go all the way.

You have proven Your power,
o Kṛṣṇa, in chasing away
the most stubborn of demons
harassing Your devotees in Vraj’.

Please
demolish the asuras of my mind
with the weapon
of Your beautiful smile!

Night has come hours ago.
I am still thinking of tasks
to be shouldered tomorrow,
even in years to come.

Truly
there is nothing in my control.
You are the controller, o Lord.
You just make me think
that it’s me who does everything,
just to keep me going
without losing that bit of courage
that’s also Your gift.

Amazing
how You accommodate
the jīva’s so called freedom of choice
and Your full control
all in one.

Helpers on the way:

the bus driver stopping
to take me in,

the old lady
in the city park greeting me
though I am a stranger to her,

Bimal and Viṣṇu dās
asking me challenging questions,

the early spring weather,
the warming rays
of the afternoon sun,

a long awaited book
that has finally been delivered.

And there is You, o Kṛṣṇa,
operating behind the scenes
from above the mundane,
beyond even the most subtle.

Help is always coming from You,
sometimes a long way
till we grasp it.

Who understands You fully,
o Kṛṣṇa, o Adhokṣaja,
You, who cannot be reached
by the senses, the mind,
the whole material world
altogether?

Nobody.
Not even Brahmā himself.

Yet there is a way,
and some know about it.
And when they get to know,
they speak in riddles,
or say nothing at all.
They are filled with a joy
beyond words of this world.

You yourself are guarding
that secret, o Lord,
yet You speak it openly
for the whole world to hear:

man-manā bhava mad bhakto …
„If you give Me your heart,
you will come to Me.“

But the world doesn’t listen.

It’s midnight sharp.
The old day is over,
the new one is to unfold.
Does it make any difference
when seen with the eyes
of eternity?
Does it make any difference
to You, the Absolute,
the entirely Other?
Does anything make any difference?

Yes there is something:
pure love.

When there is no more cheating,
however subtle or disguised.
So simple and yet so deep,
so rarely given.

But it makes all the difference
to You and me.

Numbers
Weights
Distances
Times
Names
Colors
Shapes
Sizes

nothing matters
when the ātmā is free,
master of its own self,

when the knot in the heart
is pierced.

Hope carries many faces.
Behind them it is one:
uncertainty.

To reach what lies beyond
spares none from thorns,
sharp stones
and dangerous crossings.
And even then
hopes are not always fulfilled.

Then what is it?
Helplessness.

Our attempt to control
what can’t be fathomed:
Your will, o Lord.

Even great men
fall prey to it.

Helpless we come.
Helpless we leave.
And in between we hope
because life cannot be lived
without.

Where does it come from?

So many walls.
Almost impenetrable:
the wall of ignorance.
Invisibly dense.

How to break it,
cross beyond?
bhakti

Which means,
all actions aiming
at Your pleasure,
all thoughts
running towards You.

No energy wasted.
No compromise.
No bigotry.
No fanaticism.

Govinda!

Where am I?
What’s going on?
When will You come
to rescue me?

Govinda!

Worshiping You
is the final word to all things.
For what isn’t known
to one who takes refuge
in You alone?

Worshiping You
is where all rules
find their glorious end
like rivers having reached
the ocean’s shore.

Worshiping You
turns the world upside down.
All attachments must fade
once Your mysterious glance
touches the soul.

O Govinda!
I offer heaps of roses
to Your lotusfeet.

Enough of that noise
repeating itself endlessly
in the allays of the mind!

Sounds, words, speeches,
so called news of the day,
all that outpour of ideas –

nothing but noise
leading away from You,
blocking the mind’s flow
towards Your own abode.

It could be so easy,
so fulfilling.
Instead we hang on
to these noisy dictations
hardly paying attention
to Your silent counsel
within.

Solutions
only last for some time.
Then they become problems
themselves
calling for more solutions.

This goes on day after day,
creation after creation.
Pralaya – destruction
is inevitable.
At one point
it becomes the only solution.

That’s why You teach, o Lord,
to focus our minds on You,
the Eternal, Unchangeable,
Indestructible.
That’s why You bless us
with śabdha, Your own sound,
Your mantra, Your name.

We don’t have to be
so terribly occupied
with the affairs of the people
around us:
this one got married,
this one earns that much money,
this one just passed away,
and all that …

There is always time
to allow ourselves moments
of distance, of inwardness,
time to come closer to You,
o playful, o compassionate Lord,
and sense Your presence
within and beyond all things.

It is within these moments,
when we feel ourselves safe,
guarded, and above all,
divinely loved.

What a lamentable fate
not to find entry
through this door of prayer.

Has this day
been spent meaningfully?
Have I come closer to You
who is nearest to me
at all times,
o Lord, eternal witness?

The task of the day
may have been small,
nothing worth speaking about,
but a test nevertheless,
for You don’t judge by results
seen in this world.

Sacrifice is what pleases You,
that giving back to You
which has been
and will always be Yours.

Once we understand
that nothing is ours,
that our very self
rests in Your infinite will,
we receive so much more
to serve, to offer, to love.

This is the test.

Midnight approaches.
Just a few people left
walking lonely outside
on the neon lit street.
It could be anywhere.

Fate moves them along
carrying unseen baggage
of good and bad deeds
done moments ago,
perhaps years, lifetimes,
or more.

All of them depend on Your help
whether they know it, or not –
Your help to go on
with their wants and their needs,
their dreams for tomorrow.

To You
all the same jīvas
covered by layers of matter
however refined.

To You
all the same stories
over and over again.

O inexhaustible Lord!
O shelter of Your devotees!
O refuge of the disillusioned!

I pray
not for material boons,
not for glory, not for fame,
not for heaven,
not for everlasting peace.

I pray
that one day
You may deem me worthy
to follow those
who are blessed with rāga,
unshakeable attachment to You,

that one day
rasa may dawn in my heart,
that no trace will be left
of that long and dark night
of blindness and fear,

that one day
I may serve You
for the sake of sevā alone
wherever You place me
in the dust of Your feet.

O playful Lord!
O joyful Lord!
O loving Lord!

O Lord
who knows no bounds.