Monday, March 07, 2005
Poem from Mirabai
Something has reached out and taken in the beams
of my eyes.
There is a longing, it is for his body, for every hair of
that dark body.
All I was doing was being, and the Dancing Energy
came by my house.
His face looks curiously like the moon, I saw it from
the side, smiling.
My family says:"Don't ever see him again!" and they
imply things in a low voice.
But my eyes have their own life, they laugh at rules,
and know whose they are.
I believe I can bear on my shoulders whatever you
want to say of me.
Mira says: Without the energy that lifts mountains,
how am I to live?
(version by Robert Bly and Jane Hirshfield)
When Mirabai speaks of the "dancing energy," she is clearly referring to kundalini. For her, the energies arrived primarily through her long term inner love relationship with Krishna, who was said to have moved mnontains through his strength.
Her royal family was appalled when she refused to conform to the norms of bride and mother. But the people of India loved her as a saint. After her death in 1550, they continued to recite and dance to her poems, and some still do so to this day.
of my eyes.
There is a longing, it is for his body, for every hair of
that dark body.
All I was doing was being, and the Dancing Energy
came by my house.
His face looks curiously like the moon, I saw it from
the side, smiling.
My family says:"Don't ever see him again!" and they
imply things in a low voice.
But my eyes have their own life, they laugh at rules,
and know whose they are.
I believe I can bear on my shoulders whatever you
want to say of me.
Mira says: Without the energy that lifts mountains,
how am I to live?
(version by Robert Bly and Jane Hirshfield)
When Mirabai speaks of the "dancing energy," she is clearly referring to kundalini. For her, the energies arrived primarily through her long term inner love relationship with Krishna, who was said to have moved mnontains through his strength.
Her royal family was appalled when she refused to conform to the norms of bride and mother. But the people of India loved her as a saint. After her death in 1550, they continued to recite and dance to her poems, and some still do so to this day.
