Thief of the Soul

This poem was inspired by the Gopis speaking to Krishna when they met for the Rasa Dance and Krishna disappeared like a thief after stealing their souls. But what really churned the ink were the many slokas in the Bhagavatam and other Bhakti literature that refer to Krishna as a thief. The reader will find few of them after this intro and in the footnotes.

So the conclusion that came to the heart is that the Lord in whatever form He manifests for His devotees, among the sublime qualities He always displays, there is the one of being a thief, since He enters His devotees mind and steals it. " 

SD 10.29.34 Comm. "O king of thieves! We did not come here with any other purpose than to recover the treasure that You stole from us. You have stolen our minds, but unlike other thieves You did not have to make any great endeavor. You did this simply by blowing on Your flute."

Nothing other than LOVE

Sri Sri Prema Samput p. 52    "Only to increase the love of my devotees for me, do I bestow hardship upon them and in so doing incur my own sorrow, yet I welcome that distress."

Sri Sri Prema Samput p.48 "He is not lacking anything. What do the living entities have to give Him other than their love?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=56&v=-h_9ixUreNI

In the imaginary scene of the poem Krishna is speaking confidentially to a friend sometime after Kurukshetra, in a mixture of reminiscences and emotions,  from Dwarka, to the rasa dance, to the meeting in Kurukshetra.  In doing so Krishna reveals the secret depths of his love. Krishna never puts his devotees through something which He does not take also upon Himself.

SD 32.21 "Even when I removed Myself from your sight by suddenly disappearing, I never stopped loving you."

GC 23.39 "O dearest Gopis!  The first separation has been most difficult for me."

My solitude nestled

in the recesses of the night,

and like shadows that come forth

with brighter light,

its agony too appeared,

by moonlit memories

of their love for Me.

With the ardent desire

for a tidal wave

of this ocean of their love and my love,

to flood the hearts and the stars,

I disappeared,

causing their lamentation,

and thirstily I drank from the same                               ⁽¹⁾

chalice of longing emotions

welling up from purest love.

Spying unseen

upon their absorption and tribulation

while they searched for Me,

with breathless glances,

in incessant meditation

unwavering, on Me only,

I also endured separation,                                     ⁽²⁾

and could wait no more

for their embraces                                        ⁽³⁾

as the tears of love,

furrowing their faces,

were gushing like ecstatic rivers

of their sweetest love.

And impatient,                   

covetous of the mellows

flourishing in their hearts,

in that innermost hollow I stood,

a restless spectator of their total love,

incapable of repaying

the wealth of devotion

of my most beloveds.

In the most famous and also infamous                          ⁽⁴⁾

state of Godhood of being self-satisfied,

no one could fathom why I cried,

why my heart sighed,

breathless from feeling separation,

dragged and dependent on

their selfless adoration.

I smiled anew

to soothe their hearts,

and hiding my anguish,

asked for forgiveness.

They offered their fragrant ghee of love,                          ⁽⁵⁾

and the dense honey

of sulkiness,

thus plundering my love,

so that I, delighted, sold myself.                                    ⁽⁶⁾

1) GC 23.46 "Bhakti to me produces nectar".

2) Sri Sri Prema Samput pg.50 "He is also filled with sadness as he remains hidden from his devotees, [...] on top of that he then has to tolerate the slander that he is indifferent to those who love him."

3) GB 12.7 Comm. "Not after a long time, but very quickly, since I am not able to bear delay in meeting them, I, putting them on the shoulders of Garuda, bring them to My dhama."

4) SD 82.44 Comm. "But my dear girlfriend - Krishna replied - if this is true, I must be God, but still I am conquered by your love and devotion."

Godhood is also infamous to Krishna because in His qualities as the Absolute (Controller, Self-satisfied etc) which are revered but also commonly misunderstood, His sweetness and eagerness to love as Nanda Kishor is thwarted.

5) AVC Pg.279 (Rasa Dance Begins) "He (Krishna) wanted to create unity among the opposing parties of Radha and Candravali."

6) KS Anu 170 "I have come now.  Please experience me directly at every moment."

RED DUST

- The song of the Pulindi girl of Vraja

SBB Vol.III 7.119 Purport."Seeing the kunkuma on the ground reminded them first of Krishna and then of His intimate affairs with the gopis. Thinking about these things agitated their minds [...] And how were the aborigine women relieved of this agitation?  By picking up the red powder and smearing it on their faces and breasts, which were burning with lust.  Having done this, the Pulindis felt completely satisfied."

SBB III 7.146 Purport " [...]...the aborigine women lacked the assets of knowledge, good birth, good behavior and devotion to God. They were ignorant of their own eternal identities as spirit souls, and because they had never come close enough to Nanda Maharaja's village to see Krsna with their own eyes, they were also ignorant of Krsna's all-attractive beauty.  None the less, in the forest, the aborigine women of Vraja accidentally came in contact with grass and leaves smeared with kunkuma from the bodies of the gopis   [...] even though indirect, it infused them with sublime devotion for Krishna ...[...].  Having had some contact with the gopis, the aborigine women of Vraja all attained a perfection similar to theirs, if not in this life then in the next."

SGS 1.4.56 "When they saw Him, some aborigine girls became tortured with lust."

Debt of Love

CC Antya Lila 7.43 "The conjugal love of the gopīs is the most exalted devotional service, surpassing all other methods of bhakti. Therefore Lord Krishna is obliged to say, 'My dear gopīs, I cannot repay you. Indeed, I am always indebted to you."

Prema-vilas - Ch 7. Text 126-127  by Srila Nityananda Das

"Feeling separation from Me, Radha and the gopis have given up Their lives.  Now I shall also give up My life for her.  You will see me in that condition, O Lokanath."

Excerpted from Sri Krishna Kathamrita Bindu Issue No134

"With that prema they [gopis] have given up everything. [...] By their love, Krishna's promise was broken. His pormise is -'As someone approaches me I reciprocate accordingly' {Bg 4.11} Krishna never becomes indebted, He always repays his debts. But this promise of his was broken by the gopis, because the gopis do not want anything, how will he repay them?

[...] {Bhag. 10.32.22} "I have become completely indebted to you. I cannot pay you back, because you don't want anything. What shall I do?"

To pay back his debt he became Gaura, assuming the mood of Radharani is crying and feeling acute pangs of separation from Krishna. This is Gaura. [...] As Radharani is crying, crying, crying and drowning herself in this unfathomable ocean of separation, similarly Gaura is burning himself with the fire of separations from Krishna."

TEARS of SMARANA

CC Antya lila 17.49  “Only the most fortunate ears can hear these four nectarean sounds – Krishna’s words, the tinkling of His ankle bells and bangles, His voice and the vibration of His flute. If one does not hear these sounds, his ears are as useless as small conchshells with holes.”

kṛṣṇaṁ smaran janaṁ cāsya preṣṭhaṁ nija-samīhitam
tat-tat-kathā-rataś cāsau kuryād vāsaṁ vraje sadā

Bhakti Rasāmṛta Sindhu 1.2.294  - Kṛṣṇaṁ smaran is the first injunction: “think of Krishna.” Next, janam cāsya: “In  thinking of Krishna, also think of his people.” 

My Lord, please give this unworthy person Your darshan through the nectarean sounds of Your words, the tinkling of Your ankle bells and bangles, Your voice and the sweet sound of Your flute, and make me worthy of remembering You and Your eternal associates.

I am unworthy and not qualified

to see You with these eyes,

my heart tormented not

by thirst, cannot even cry

in separation from You,

nor swoons

into waters mirroring

the rain clouds, ⁽¹⁾

nor is anxious

like an animal of Vraja at night ⁽²⁾

when you leave the forest

along with the sunlight.

Yet this pretender

might use the other senses,

if You allow, to remember ….

let me hear, perhaps,Your bells

where the butter jars hang,

and of the love Yasoda sings

while churning or boiling the milk;

 let me smell the camphor from your breath 

meandering out of your flute, 

while I wander about

on these day dream plains,

where at dawn resounds

the tinkling of bangles

from all corners of the valley;

let me hear the sound

of your bugle,

waking everyone around

to join You into the forest, ⁽³⁾

and traversing the secret pathways,

I wish to come to that place

patterned by the Gopis' toes

and to overhear from the dust

Your loving words; ⁽⁴⁾

then enwrapped by dusk

I will take off at a run,

 letting my heart in a state of agitation

transport me to that forest 

amidst whose trees,

 I can hear perhaps

your voice calling

the cows one by one,

or that single melodious fluted note

that attracts and stuns

movable and immovable beings;

let me walk into this dream

as the cows and calves

stir up the dust that covers your skin,

and fantasizing - I'll roll - so rapt,

as if I was just behind

the cruel wheels of Your chariot

where stones and wood

melted into rills of tears. ⁽⁵⁾

This longing to see You

swells up

tears of smarana,

dripping

in a hoof-print on the soil of Vraja

from my soaked heart

as if it is hanging

from a sentient tree

like an ecstatic parrot.

NOTES

1. NVM p.44 "Once in Pramodana the Gopis went to fetch water in a lake -Krishna Kunda-.

The reflection of dark clouds in the water sparked in the Gopis such intense feelings for Krishna that they fainted." 

2. SBB III 6.77  “The forest animals were miserable because now they had to part from Him,  Unable to go anywhere without Him, they simply stood at the entrance of the village, ready to spend the entire night there in the hope of seeing their Lord again the next morning.” 

3. SB 10.21.1 "O King one day Krishna decided to take His breakfast as a picnic in the forest.  Having risen early in the morning, He blew His bugle made of horn and woke all the cowherd boys and calves with its beautiful sound. Then Krishna and the boys, keeping their respective groups of calves before them, proceeded from Vrajabhumi to the forest.”   

4. NVM pg.312 "In Umrao in Vraja there is a holy spot where this pastime is remembered, when the Gopis ran to see Krishna and taken by shyness started to draw in the dust with their toes. "

"And with those same blessings one can aspire to overhear Krishna's affectionate words to the gopis [even today]."  

5. Bhakti Ratnakara Ch.5  p.144 "What can I say?  Only those who saw the scene can understand.  All the damsels of Vraja came running to see Krishna with tears flowing like rivers from their eyes.  Seeing that scene even wood and stone melted.  No one could describe this even with millions of mouths." 

Rasa Dance

Sri Krsna Samhita Txt 18 by Bhaktivinoda Thakura : "[...] there is an energy known as attraction in all material atoms.  By the strength of this energy atoms are attracted to each other and they thus create a globular planet.  When these planets are attracted to a larger globular planet, they begin to move around it. [....]  In the spiritual world the ever-existing attachment extends love up to mahabhava, and in the material world the reflection extends as an inconceivable material attraction that creates variegatedness.  [...] ...we say that in the material world the sun along with the planets are constantly moving around the Dhruva constellation (pole star) by the strength of its attraction just as all pure living entities eternally circle around Krishna by the strength of His attraction."

Srila Prabhupada Paris, Bhagavad-gita 13.1-2 "Ksetra means the platform on which, or the stage on which we are dancing. That is called ksetra. And ksetra-jna means the person who is dancing. That is ksetra-jna. When you, when you dance, you know that I am dancing on this ground, on this platform. So you are knower. Therefore ksetra-jna. And the platform on which you are dancing, that is ksetra. So we are all dancing... In the material world, we are all dancing. How we are dancing? Getting a particular type of body. That is ksetra. There must be some platform."

Mother Yasoda tells Krishna and Balaram : "My dear Rama and Damodar, dance more, dance more! I'll give you condensed milk, butter and cream!"

RASA DANCE

The day I wake up

from this reflection of my sleep,

I'll see the true attraction

that moves everything;

it is not the gravity

as the mundane mind perceives,

that holds down to the ground

movable and unmovable beings;

or the force that pulls the planets,

that brings closer the stars,

which moves galaxies
 around the pole star;

this force so strong

holds the heavens in place,

the neurons and the protons
and to this material cage
also the soul.

When the illusory reality

 slackens its grip,

the dance of the Sufi in me

will stop its selfish twirls, ⁽¹⁾

I'll see the Supreme Being

without and within,

and His love as the force

that attracts in dance all beings,

the planets, the stars and the universes

circling, rotating and revolving; 

it is a fact well-known

that nothing, no one dances alone,

'cause as the Lord and His consort,

in a suffusion of love, 
dance and whirl around,   ⁽²⁾

 then the myriad of dancers who surround

also move and spin around;

this attraction then reflects, 

and from the infinite
to the finite skies extends
far and beyond,

and inconceivably bonds

 clusters of globes

and rotates the worlds;

then it transforms

into gravity, into variety,

and attracts to one another

the living beings, the atoms,

         the moon and the sea,      ⁽³⁾   

and draws lovers to meet;

dancing, dancing 

the worlds are dancing,

when the lotus opens in the heart,

rhythm and pace

become infinite space,

and only love 
makes eternal time to pass,

in this way time is love
and love is dance.

___________________________________

(1) Sufi Whirling or Dervish Dance is a spiritual practice, a meditation, a mystical abandon to the Divine Love through the mind.   Because the Sufi dancer spins around his centre for long time it is referred to in the poem as "selfish whirls" symbolizing the self-centredness that characterizes the ego of those unaware of their identity as spirit soul as well as their interconnection and interrelation in the dance of God.

2) NVM Vol. III pg 375 "This rasa dance, which is rarely heard of and even more rarely seen, happens when Radha and Krsna, dissatisfied with being a single couple, expand Themselves to become many dancers at once."

3) Vaubhava Vani pg.170 "[..]; and the ebb and flow of the tide, caused by attraction."

-Excerpted from a class on modern physics on YouTube

"[...]  they [the scientists] just do not understand. How two particles are going to move we do not understand, we might understand "pushing" but we do not understand "pulling" from a distance. Quantum will never be able to answer "pulling" or what keeps a neuron bound to a proton.
Physics says that there is a field of attraction, but how does work? why the protons do not fly away? what is the mechanism?"

-Excerpted from Cosmology on Trial  pg 105

"In the experiment of the double-slit raised the awareness that the particles had some sort of information.  Reality seems to be a product of some form of consciousness.  More amazing is the mysterious phenomenon of entanglement of particles.
When two atoms are entangled with one another they share a peculiar connection that is instantaneous and unaffected by distance.  Experiments establish  that even over a vast stellar expanse, the atoms remain connected [...].  This behavior is so synchronized, like a choreographed dance ...." 

LOVE under the TAMARIND TREE

In my search for the pastimes of Krishna in Vraja where He manifests His golden form as Caitanya Mahaprabhu, the pastime at Imli Tal is a shining gem.

This is in short :

When Shri Radha disappeared from the midst of the rasa dance, Krishna was searching for Her with intense feelings of separation. This mood of separation increased Their anticipation for meeting, and thus very much increased Their intensity of love.Krishna, in this mood of separation sat down under this Tamarind Tree or Imli Tal and became so completely absorbed in the thoughts of Shrimati Radharani and chanting Her name, that His body assumed the color of Shrimati Radharani.

Nava Vraja Mahima "For a moment Radha and Krshna gazed into each other's faces, and then, in the same way that the moon sinks into the ocean, They submerged Themselves in the waves of each other's ambrosial beauty." pg 363

"God is engaged in enjoying with His eternal consort, Śrīmati Rādhārāṇī. This Śrīmati Rādhārāṇī is enchanting Kṛṣṇa, and Kṛṣṇa is enchanting Rādhārāṇī. [...] In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta it is said that when Kṛṣṇa comes before Rādhārāṇī, She becomes so much engladdened by seeing the beauty of Kṛṣṇa that She becomes more beautiful, and as soon as Rādhārāṇī becomes beautiful, Kṛṣṇa becomes engladdened and He becomes more beautiful. So unlimitedly there is competition of becoming more beautiful, duhe lage hurai (?). That is the state. Competition. Because in the spiritual world everything is unlimited. So unlimitedly both of them becoming beautiful and both of them enjoying unlimitedly."Srila Prabhupada - Lecture on SB 1.2.8 -- New Vrindaban

Under the spell of the lunar light

Shyam took a beam

to adorn Radha's face,

but saw it brighter than the Moon!

as Her eyes like Chakora birds

flew on the rays

drinking the moonlight of His face.

Radha slipped a berry in His mouth

with grace

and hesitant fingertips ~

how much redder now were His lips!

'cause Krishna, sipping

the red lotus of Her eyes,

was instantly drowned 

by the sweetness of Her love

and fell spellbound.

Closing His eyes

tuned a note on His flute

to attract Her mind,

but when surprised to find

       Her behind His eyelid    (1)

a shiver ran up His skin,

and enraptured He screamed

Radhe, Radhe,

under that Tamarind tree,

under the stars in the sky,

on the river of Their Love,

He sat and cried,

and drifted into ecstasy

in an unknown shoreless sea,

lost His mind in Her heart,

and became the Moon,

golden glowing

with Her love mood.

1) Gopala Campu 17.3 “Whenever Radha or Krishna fainted in private, they had an internal vision of their lover, equivalent to actual presence, for bringing auspicious results.”

IMLI Tal mentioned in Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila Ch. 18.76-78

"The tamarind tree named Teṅtulī-talā was very old, having been there since the time of Lord Kṛṣṇa's pastimes. Beneath the tree was a very shiny platform.

Since the River Yamunā flowed near Teṅtulī-talā, a very cool breeze blew there. While there, the Lord saw the beauty of Vṛndāvana and the water of the River Yamunā.

Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu used to sit beneath the old tamarind tree and chant the holy name of the Lord. At noon He would return to Akrūra-tīrtha to take lunch."