Moments Eternal

O! Let me clasp Your Feet!

I am sitting at my writing desk. In front of me is a picture of the Mother’s Divine Feet. And as I fix my eyes on it an unearthly joy fills my heart. Memories of how this picture came to me come flooding in.

Every year, before my birthday, the Mother would ask me:

“What would you like?”

And strangely, at that moment I just could not wish for anything! I could not think of anything to ask for. After coming down from Her room I would tell myself that for my next birthday I would ask Her for a picture of Her Divine Feet. But then each time the same thing repeated itself!

“What would you like?”

Hardly had I heard these words than I would forget everything. I do not know why this happened, but I really felt that there was nothing I wanted. To me it remained a source of supreme mystery.

In 1972 I offered my birthday ‘pranam’ at the Mother’s

Feet for what was to be the last time. After completing my ‘pranam’ as usual, and accepting the Mother’s flower-blessings, I was about to leave the room when Champaklal-ji called out:

“Priti, the Mother is calling you.”

From the door I quickly went back to the Mother. As I knelt down, Champaklal-ji handed the Mother a colour photograph of Her Divine Feet. She sweetly smiled and then gave me this photograph.

I couldn’t believe it and was overcome with joy. Was it really true? For on this day the Mother had fulfilled at last such a long-cherished wish of mine. I bowed at Her Feet once again. A line echoed within me:

I have looked upon you, I have surrendered my life, I am tied to Your adorned Feet forever!

I turned back in silence and slowly left the room. As I was going down the stairs, I could not help feeling somewhat amazed. Such a long-cherished wish had finally been fulfilled! And my heart overflowed with gratitude…

I sat in silence for a long time at the spot where the Mother’s couch stands today. How could I have known then that one year later Her Body would be brought down from Her room and kept at this very spot? And that this was to be my last visit to the Mother? Perhaps that was why the Mother had fulfilled that day my long-cherished wish by giving me this photograph of Her Lotus Feet. I was sitting facing Sri Aurobindo in the picture that stands today in the front hall. But at that time this photograph was all there was in the place where the Mother’s couch is kept today. After Sri Aurobindo left His Body this photograph was installed there. We would bow down to Him there every morning and evening and pray: “O Lord, O Divine

Sri Aurobindo, come back, come back. Bring to our country, India, unity, make Her one, O Lord.” I still utter the same prayer regularly. Will not the Lord fulfil our prayer?

We love the Mother. We have all felt Her, sometimes as Mother Aditi Herself, sometimes as Maheshwari, at other times as Mahakali, Mahalakshmi or as Maha-saraswati. Standing next to a fire, how can our body not be touched by its warmth? And in spite of our untransformed, ignorant condition the Mother’s Grace has so spontaneously blessed us in all Her forms. But we have never known the Mother’s Body or had the experience of it as being fully Divine. We found Her so close to us in such an effortless way that it never even occurred to us that this human body of the Mother, in whose protection we have been advancing on this difficult path, is in its every atom and in its very external form too, the body of Mother Aditi Herself. Being so close to the Mother we always looked upon the Mother physically as our best friend. But how immeasurably valuable this was, was revealed to us one day by the Mother Herself in the course of events. What an amazing experience that was!

When the Mother played tennis, She would always wear a pair of ‘tabi’, a special Japanese footwear which was neither shoe nor sock but it was most comfortable. The pairs of ‘tabi’ that the Mother had brought from Japan were all more or less worn out. One day the Mother was talking to Vasudha about

‘tabis’ at the tennis-court. They were discussing how to procure these ‘tabis’. As I was standing beside them I overheard everything. And as luck would have it, just a few days later my youngest uncle arrived here. He was to go to Japan and had come to the Mother to ask for Her permission. I was delighted beyond words.

“You have to get some ‘tabis’ for Mother from Japan,” I

told my uncle.

“Get me the measurement of the Mother’s Feet. Only then will the ‘tabis’ fit Her,” my uncle replied.

With a sheet of paper and pencil in my hand I entered Her room in the Playground. She had come back after playing tennis and was resting on Her sofa.

“Could you please place your Feet on this paper? I will make a tracing. My youngest uncle (Himansu) is going to Japan. He’ll get some ‘tabis’ for you and needs your size,” I told Her.

The Mother agreed at once.

I bent down to trace out the Mother’s Feet. The more I looked at Her Feet, the more I was filled with wonder. My hand would just not move. I had never had such an opportunity to look at Her Feet for so long. I was enamoured, enamoured of the fine shape and beauty of Her Feet and toes and I kept staring at them, oblivious of everything. What marvellous beautiful Feet! Each toe was so finely shaped and so beautifully kept. The sun’s brilliant glow was there on the Mother’s Feet and toes. Each nail looked like a miniature shell crafted with the subtlest of artistry. The beauty of the lotus and the soft smoothness of morning dew had come together in the making of the Mother’s Feet. Brilliance, beauty and softness wondrously met in the Mother’s Feet. I had never had in my life the good fortune of seeing the Mother’s Feet in this way. I felt truly blessed!

I do not remember how long I must have sat there staring at the Mother’s Feet. I suddenly came back to my senses when the Mother gently touched my head. I quickly traced out Her Feet with the pencil. Raising my head and looking at Her Feet I exclaimed:

“Such lovely Feet, Mother! How beautiful indeed!”

The Mother sweetly smiled and said a little mysteriously: “Why, haven’t you ever seen the Feet of gods and goddesses?”

I was flabbergasted. Sure! The Feet of Mother Durga, Mahalakshmi, Maha-saraswati resembled Hers. All those sculptors who have made images of gods and goddesses must have had a vision of the Mother in some subtle world. That is why they were inspired to carve these images. I was awestruck. We humans could gaze at the Mother’s divine Body in a human form from so close in this mortal world! Gaze and be blessed! It is one thing to be able to see these incomparable Feet in a painting or a statue but the fact that the Mother has come down on this earth with those same Feet and we are able to see and touch Them is quite another. It is an experience in itself. I remained seated, speechless in wonder. The Mother blessed me once again by touching my head. A marvellous thrill of delight ran through my entire body. I placed my head at Her Feet and bowed to Her. This ‘pranam’, from that moment, took on a special meaning in my life.

I stood up with the paper and pencil in my hand and as I came out of the Mother’s room I looked up and noticed the western sky aglow in red and the sun’s rays were streaming from behind in all the four directions. Were not the Mother’s Feet created from these very rays of the sun? Who was that sculptor? Two lines of a poem echoed in my being:

Janani, tomar korun charanakhani

Herinu aji e arunkirona rupe.

(O Mother, I have beheld your compassionate Feet today in the rays of the Sun.)