Just to attain your holy feet
This wretch calls out your nameFrom the depths of time
Just to grasp your precious feet
This wretch calls out your name
Trapped in the circle of time
From my own past created
For what fault was I plunged
Into the cycle of becoming?
From my own fiber created
For what fault have I been thrown
Into the ocean of time?
Why brought to this world
Guru, o guru
Why brought to this world
In such an abject state that I forgot
Your compassionate name?
Just to attain your holy feet
This wretch calls out your name
From the depths of time
You bear the name of wish-fulfilling tree
So the clan of ascetics told me
You bear the name of wish-fulfilling tree
So the clan of ascetics told me
Why be renowned as compassionate
If you can't help me be free?
Of what use is your fame as compassionate
If you can't help me be free?
Just to grab your precious feet
This wretch calls out your name
From the depths of time
I fail to remember Heeruchand's feet
Heedless Panjushah says
O Master...
I fail to remember Heeruchand's feet
Unmindful Panjushah says
Is this your famed compassion
That you don't let me near your feet
Just to attain your holy feet
This wretch calls out your name
From the depths of time
From the Kabir Project:
The ultimate Truth, or God, can be found only if our longing is intensely one-pointed. Even a flicker of distraction takes this experience out of our feeble grasp. The poet Panju Shah declares in this song that he seeks only the feet of his guru. That is his sole purpose for taking birth. He challenges the guru, who bears the name of compassionate, to prove his compassion by giving him, Panju Shah, the gift of his feet.
If there is an embodiment of intensity, Parvathy is it. As our friend, as an advisor, as a fiery challenger, she has brought us into deeper touch with ourselves. Her tears flow freely in this song while she sings of this longing, and embodies it so intensely. Yet, often, she breaks out into laughter right after weeping through a whole song. She shows us what it might mean to hold that elusive intensity of longing within oneself.
This recording was made as part of our week-long immersion with Parvathy at her home and akhada on the outskirts of Trivandrum in September 2011. She warmly welcomed us, housed us, fed us, sang for us and spoke to us with great depth and insight about the Baul path and about life itself. An experience that we still carry with us.
Parvathy Baul is a Baul singer and saadhika, painter and storyteller from Bengal and has been a disciple of Shashanko Goshai and Sanatan Das Baul. She currently lives in Trivandrum, Kerala. (www.parvathybaul.srijan.asia)
