THE LIGHT THAT NEVER FADES

There arises again the sweet face of 'Bhaskar tanaya' (daughter of Bhaskar) with her lunar smile spreading across the expanse of our hearts, drawing us all to her even as devotee is drawn to the Divine out of carefree love, causeless and free of material bond. The innocence of the face, the sublimity of the look and the fragrance of the soul permeating the entire persona of this little girl evokes the best element in a man and raises his consciousness spontaneously to a higher plane for the while.

There are on earth two types that abound and one of the types is the rarer species, the 'vidya shakti' (the force that frees), the other, the more abundant, the 'avidya shakti' or the material force that binds. Sanghita represents perennially the former with her effulgence transcending finite barriers of time and space and illumining her father's heart with the deeper glow of an ethereal order which is the essence in all but to which all are not privy in their mad rush for the mundane pursuits of this world.

When intelligence combines with feeling and the twain are united in a singular uplift into the spiritual realm, a Sanghita is born, the one that binds all in 'lokasangraha' (gathering in of all for the collective well-being). But in her specific incarnation such a splendour remained in the realm of well-defined possibilities which never in the full materialised, for too short was her earthly sojourn.

But she was a being in the penumbra of realisation and soon entered the bright illumination of the gods whence there is no return. The karmic sheet being balanced, all that remained was the vast Void which is the summation of all events. There on the event horizon she abides with a tinge of personality, perhaps, hanging on with her stock of sattva (spiritual qualities) for a renewal of earthly experience, waiting for her father's hospitality again.

The dewy drops are shed each time the moon passes in her heavenly circumambulation of the earth and the daughter laughs that celestial laughter that peels past earthly resistance to lift the spirit of her father to her cosmic altitude. Thus, has the dialogue been set as Luna waxes and wanes in her orbit and a father, bereaved and grieving, awakes to the sunshine of life each time the lunar beam dances on the lake or shimmers with a strange glow revealing a deeper being. And the peals of laughter spread across the bosom of the heavens even unto the mother's breast and she fills up with the honeyed essence of Truth :

madhu vaata hritaayate
madhu-ksharanti sindhavah
maadhvir-nah santv-oshadhi
madhu naktam-utoshaso
madhumat paarthivam rajah
madhu daur-astu nah-pitaa
madhumaan-no vanaspatir
madhumam-astu suryah
madhvir-gavo bhavantu nah

shung no mitrah shung varunah
shung no bhavatv-aryamaa
shung no indro brihaspatih
shung no vishnur-urukramah

om shantih om shantih om shantih
(The Rig Veda --1.90.06-09)