Daily Poem


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This is a poem by the nineteenth century mystic Ramprasad Sen

The Diamond Essence of Awareness

Ma Tara, you are truly the exalted one,
the essence of awareness.
But are you aware of the foolish poet
who sings this song?
You are indeed the radiant truth,
the sun that dissolves like morning mist
the illusory suffering of conscious beings.
But what about my persistent misery?

Revelatory experience flows to devout practitioners
from the Mother of the Universe,
but consider what Mother bestows on me.
During morning meditation, I worry about livelihood.
At noon prayer, I think about delicious food.
While practicing contemplation in the evening,
my mind wanders at random among events of the day.

Goddess Tara, I ask you frankly,
will you ever allow this distracted consciousness
any sustained vision of your reality?
The only visionary gift granted me
is the viewpoint of arbitrary convention.
In this fascinating vision, I am constantly absorbed.

The deeper I plunge into thought,
the more I realize I cannot know you by thinking,
0 blissful Mother, beyond speech and mind.

This desperate seeker of truth cries out:
“Ma! Ma! Ma!
Daughter of the mystic mountain!
You dance, holding the brilliant gem of realization.
But when I try to grasp
the diamond essence of awareness,
it appears to turn back into common stone.”

By: Ramprasad Sen

Translated by Lex Hixon