A PRAYER TO BHAGAWAN RAMANA MAHARSHI

Oh, brilliant eyes!
Yet to blossom smile!
Visage profoundly serene!
Show me the way sublime.

Out of this mesh much knotted,
In which I am woefully trapped,
Made of mind and intellect
Understanding and what not,

Of teachers by whom I aver,
Of books I don’t close ever,
Of a body demanding care,
Of senses gone haywire.

I know all these to be
Not me, because I do see.
Yet, I know not the seeing me,
For blind is my inner eye.

“All you know is you are not,
What knows is you” I am taught
"Knowing this much will suffice
You then are self-realized".

“A mere understanding, isn’t this?”
I question losing all my wits.
“Yes, it is so by all the means,
It does take place in the mind”.

“Isn’t mind in knowing?” I ask
“So what?” “The wise does think” they remark
“The wise does act, the wise does read,
The wise does enjoy the food he eats”.

“Granted all that” I concede
“The wise knows not that he reads,
That he acts and that he eats,
The way we do so incomplete”.

Didn’t our Sage say the wise is like
One in himself fast asleep
On a shaky cart on potholed track
Knowing not the shocking creaks.

My soulful plea therefore Lord Ramana,
Dear Sage of Holy Arunachala!
Cast your kind glance upon me
Truth of “Who am I?” so I see.

So I realize what it is like
Being in this tumultuous sea
Knowing and yet knowing not
Knowing all as me in me.

Soaring up and up the sky
Wingless, mindless, ever-free,
Unbridled by whims of intellect,
Unburdened by notions pet,

In the sky of Pure Being
To which Your eyes beckon,
To the beauty of spaceless expanse,
Where Your smile shines and awakens.

ramaNArpaNaM astu