(rendered into English by Dr. Sista Shanta)
(Continued from the Previous Issue)
What is your design Mother !!!
I composed the song “what is your design Mother?” when I was working in Guntur (between 1-10-1957 and 3-10-1957). Those days I used to suffer from severe stomach pain and burning because of diarrhea. I used to visit the toilet at least twenty times a day. Only then I would feel a little relief. Four to five months passed. One day Nori Venkateswara Rao garu and Gangaraju Venkateswarlu garu suggested that we should go to Jillellamudi for the Sankranti festival. (Sankranti is the harvest festival that comes in the month of January around the fourteenth of the month. This is also the auspicious time when the Sun travels into the Northern hemisphere).
I was hesitant to go. Mother was extremely capable and powerful. But She suffered like any other ordinary woman. This suffering of Mother I could not accept. Couldn’t Mother mitigate her suffering? This was my prayer. So I sulked and came away from Jillellamudi some time ago. Therefore I was hesitant to go. This was the only way, I thought, to register my appeal and protest to Mother. But I also knew that I was hurting Mother indirectly.
I stayed in Jillellamudi with Nori garu and Gangaraju garu for four days. The problem which I could not get rid of, in-spite of taking several medicines, disappeared in no time. This is possible only for Mother because of her divine powers.
“What is your design Mother?
What is your intention less?
This is the burden of the song. When asked “What is the cause for creation, sustenance and dissolution” Mother replied, “No cause is the cause.” When She spoke about this to Sri Radhakrishna Sarma She said “without any intention but born of no intention.” This is the marvelous truth.
Is it to detach your attachment
(not to show love is your way of loving!)
Is affection the rhythm/symbol?
Is equal treatment your idea?
What is your music that is tuneful, thoughtful and rhythmic?
This is the first verse.
To Mother everything appears the same. She has no special likes and dislikes. On the one hand She wants everything and on the other She wants nothing. Like a drop on a lotus leaf She is detached and without any impressions that are brought forward from the previous birth or incidents in life. She is full of attachment, filled with love and simultaneously She is without attachment. (Indeed a bundle of contradictions). Everyone should be happy. By feeding and clothing everyone She would rejoice.
“You are all my children” She says. She did not renounce anything and nor did She put on the cohere robes: She yearns for everybody’s welfare and feels jubilant in their happiness. In a way she has no commitments (baadara bandi). She is amidst everyone but unattached. She is both an embodiment of love, attachment and also detachment, destroyer of the bond of affection!!! But the love She showers on everyone surprises everyone: and by this love every one in the world wants to be enslaved. What is Mother’s actual attitude and design?
Usually when we perform the worship of Gods we begin the worship with a statement about our location i.e. the place from where we are performing the worship — starting at the level of macrocosm, the geographical location in the universe and zero down to the microcosmic level of the actual location of our house in the island of Jambu in the Bharata varsha to the East or West of a well known pilgrim center like Srisailam or Tirupati, between two well known rivers etc. with the person’s name and Gotra (family name) for achieving the four Purusharthas i..e the goals of life according to the Vedic Tradition Dharma (righteousness) Artha (wealth) Kama (Desire) or wishes and the ultimate Moksha (liberation), he/she is offering the worship. This is called Sankalpa.
But what is Mother’s purpose? (Sankalpa?) What is the significance of her existence? What is her desire? What is her wish?
Does Mother say “to the south of mountain Meru”? What is this globe, earth? She is the entire universe. I am with Mother, therefore I know my location. But what is Mother’s location? So I said in my song, “What is your location and what is mine in the universe?”
“Oh! you introduce me as your companion !!” I said. What I meant was “that I don’t exist without her. Everything is her creation and I am a part of it. Only when She wishes I can be here. I am only a speck in this wonderful infinite creation. How will you know that this Mannava Buchiraju Sarma is worshiping you? In the eighty four lakhs of generation how infinitesimally small is my existence! “What a lot of happiness you experience when you know who you actually are.” I said. That is Mother, you know who you are. You recognise yourself. That is the reason why you are in an exalted state. This makes you blissful. What is the happiness that you experience in your mind? Happiness is related to the mind: comfort is related to the body: bliss is related to the soul.
“There is yet another type of happiness to be found in this world. We feel happy when our adversary is suffering or is miserable. Sometimes we experience joy for no reason. A puppy is sleeping and a small baby is crying because it cannot sleep. To please the baby and to comfort it we pelt a stone at the puppy which starts squealing and this amuses the baby and he stops crying. To please one we hurt the other. So in these innumerable ways people experience happiness. But Mother, what gives you happiness? Are all these a part of you? Or nothing is a part of you?
You are the Universe and you move about in the Universe
How do I express my experiences which are beyond the ken of thought!
What has emerged out of your heart that you look into that experience!!
This is the third stanza. What is meant by this is “Mother! you are the embodiment of patience like Mother Earth. Though you are the Mother Earth you live on earth (like any other being). You are Mother Earth whose very nature is endurance. Why did you take the form of a woman and come on to the earth? Why do I get such ideas? People say,” you are Anasuya devi, wife of Karanam (Village Officer) and a mother of three children, an ordinary housewife.” But I feel you are Mother Earth. When I want to think about you I realize you are beyond the ken of human thought. To look into means to look into oneself. That is to see yourself within yourself. When this takes place what do you think? What ideas emerged from you? What use is all this for me and for the entire world? This comparing my limited self with the infinite self of Mother resulted in my composing this song.
(to be continued)