Yesterday
I lived bewildered,
In illusion.
But now I am awake,
Flawless and serene,
Beyond the world.
From my light
The body and the world arise.
So all things are mine,
Or nothing is.
Now I have given up
The body and the world,
I have a special gift.
I see the infinite Self.
As a wave,
Seething and foaming,
Is only water.
So all creation,
Streaming out of the Self,
Is only the Self.
Consider a piece of cloth.
It is only threads!
So all creation,
When you look closely,
Is only the Self.
Like the sugar
In the juice of the sugarcane,
I am the sweetness
In everything I have made.
When the Self is unknown
The world arises,
Not when it is known.
But you mistake
The rope for the snake.
When you see the rope,
The snake vanishes.
My nature is light,
Nothing but light.
When the world arises
I alone am shining.
When the world arises in me,
It is just an illusion,
Water shimmering in the sun.
A vein of silver on mother-of-pearl,
A serpent in a strand of rope.
From me the world streams out
And in me it dissolves,
As a bracelet melts into gold,
A pot crumbles into clay,
A wave subsides into water.
I adore myself.
How wonderful I am!
I can never die.
The whole world may perish,
From Brahma to a blade of grass,
But I am still here.
Indeed how wonderful!
I adore myself.
For I have taken form
But I am still ONE.
Neither coming or going,
Yet I am still everywhere. . .
I am the infinite ocean.
When thoughts spring up,
The wind freshens, and like waves
A thousand worlds arise.
But when the wind falls,
The trader sinks with his ship,
On the boundless ocean of my being
He founders,
And all the worlds with him.
But, Oh how wonderful!
I am the unbounded deep
In whom all living things
Naturally arise,
Rush against each other playfully,
And then subside.
From: The Heart of Awareness
A translation of the Ashtavakra Gita by Thomas Byrom
While in India, Kamal decided to start a blog about his adventures as a way to keep in touch with family and friends.
http://ripkynkamal.blogspot.com
I pray his writings will inspire you like they have me. We will miss his passing but we take great comfort in knowing that he has returned to that infinite ocean of unchanging love. Now enjoying the bliss of samadhi with Holy Mother, Thakur & Narendra. Shiva, Shiva, Higher Birth!!
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EMAIL FROM KAMAL
From: Ripkyn Murphy <kamal.ripkyn@gmail.com>
Date: Saturday, June 23, 2012
Subject: Re: [India] New comment on Hey Mom, So I'm here at the University. They put....
To: <njoyart@gmail.com>
Dear Andra,
Thanks so much for putting the idea of starting a blog in my head, I think that will be the easiest way to let people know what's going on with me. Thanks also for linking my blog with yours, hopefully some people can find it and get something out of reading it. I looked at your blog and was very impressed, it's very well done and has a lot of great information on it. Vedanta needs more people like you who are willing to use the internet to spread the word to people who are searching for it.
Stay in Touch,
Kamal
In the words of Swami Vivekananda:
"One day a drop of water fell into the vast ocean.
When it found itself there,
It began to weep and complain just as you are doing.
The great ocean laughed at the drop of water.
"Why do you weep?" it asked. "I do not understand.
When you join me, you join all your brothers and sisters,
The other drops of water of which I am made.
You become the ocean itself.
If you wish to leave me,
You have only to rise up on a sunbeam into the clouds.
From there you can descend again,
A little drop of water,
A blessing and a benediction to the thirsty earth."
- His Eastern and Western Admirers, Reminiscences of Swami Vivekananda, Advaita Ashrama, 1964
