The Song of the Poppadum

[Guest guest]

As any cook must agree

the product of the recipe

must may be made by 'me'

 

From that pot of slow condensing

reduced to such a claim:

Simply know,

what Self Realisation is.

 

A hold of this

is That

 

Why flutter away

comparing the butterfly's wings?

 

 

 

 

The Song of the

Poppadum

In 1914

or 1915, Bhagavan was living in Virupaksha

Cave

with his mother, who

did most of the cooking. He himself

was a skilled cook and

both then and later often helped to

prepare the food. On

one occasion his mother was making

poppadum, a thin round cake

made of black gram flour fried

crisp, and she called

him to help her. Instead of doing so,

however, he composed

this poem giving instructions for

spiritual development

under the symbolism of making

poppadum.

 

 

 

1. Try and make some poppadums.

Eat them and your longing satisfy.

Don’t roam the world disconsolate.

Heed the word, unique, unspoken

Taught by the teacher true who teaches

The truth of Being-Awareness-Bliss.

Try and make some . . . satisfy.

 

2. Take the black-gram, ego-self,

Growing

in the fivefold body-field

And grind it in the quern,

The wisdom-quest of ‘Who am l?’

Reducing it to finest flour.

Try and make some . . . satisfy.

 

3. Mix it with pirandai-juice,

Which is holy company,

Add mind-control, the cummin-seed,

The pepper of self-restraint,

The salt of non-attachment,

And asafoetida, the aroma

Of virtuous inclination.

Try and make some . . . satisfy.

 

4. In the Heart-mortar place

the dough.

And with mind-pestle inward turned,

Pound it hard with strokes of ‘I’, ‘I’,

Then flatten it with the rolling-pin

Of stillness on the level slab (of Being).

Work away, untiring, steady, cheerful.

Try and make some . . . satisfy.

 

5. Put the poppadum in

the ghee of Brahman

Held in the pan of infinite silence

And fry it over the fire of knowledge.

Now as I transmuted into That,

Eat and taste the Self as Self,

Abiding as the Self alone.

Try and make some . . . satisfy.

 

 

(Translated by Prof.

K. Swaminathan)