Thursday, June 15, 2017

Mirabai


"I have felt the swaying of the elephant's shoulders; and now you want me to climb
on a jackass? Try to be serious."
- Mīrābāī, in “Christian Mysticism East and West




"The Moon was perched like a golden hawk on the mango tree.
I knew the moon was like me ~ in heat, crazed and hunting.
So I climbed up there with that wild old gal thinking:
Two drunk beauties like us will surely snag Krishna with our eyes.


One night as I walked in the desert the mountains rode on my shoulders...
and the sky became my heart,
and the earth - my own body, I explored.
Every object began to wink at me, and Mira wisely calculated thinking,
My charms must be at their height
now would be a good time to rush into his arms, maybe He won't drop me so quick."
- Mira Bai, Love Poems from God




Meera, also known as Meera Bai or Mirabai, was a 16th-century Hindu mystic poet and devotee of Krishna. She is a celebrated Bhakti saint, particularly in the North Indian Hindu tradition.

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A painting of Meera Bai










Meera Bai was born into a Rajput royal family of Kudki district of Pali, Rajasthan, India. She is mentioned in Bhaktamal, confirming that she was widely known and a cherished figure in the Bhakti movement culture by about 1600 CE. Most legends about Meera mention her fearless disregard for social and family conventions, her devotion to god Krishna, her treating Krishna as her husband, and she being persecuted by her in-laws for her religious devotion. She has been the subject of numerous folk tales and hagiographic legends, which are inconsistent or widely different in details.
Thousands of devotional poems in passionate praise of Lord Krishna are attributed to Meera in the Indian tradition, but just a few hundred are believed to be authentic by scholars, and the earliest written records suggest that except for two poems, most were written down only in the 18th century Many poems attributed to Meera were likely composed later by others who admired Meera. These poems are commonly known as bhajans, and are popular across India. Hindu temples, such as in Chittorgarh fort, are dedicated to Mira Bai's memory. Legends about Meera's life, of contested authenticity, have been the subject of movies, comic strips and other popular literature in modern times.

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