The Yoga Vāsiṣṭha Project

Om... Om... Om Before the world, a word was waiting Before the word, a silence sang A poet closed his eyes at daybreak And every universe began He wrote a river, wrote a mountain Wrote a prince with heavy eyes Wrote a sage whose voice was morning Then stepped inside his own sunrise This is the story within the story The dream that dreams the dreamer awake Listen: the teller becomes the telling The ocean singing itself as wave And you who hear it, you are in it A lamp inside a lamp inside a flame Whoever truly hears this story Will never be the same Om... Om... Om Om Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Every listener becomes the listening Every reader turns the page of themselves Om

I walked through every golden city I touched the silk, I wore the crown But beauty fades like breath on mirrors And every tower tumbles down What is youth A guest of morning What is wealth A wave that leaves I have seen the river swallow kingdoms Tell me something time can't thieve So I lay my questions at your feet What never dies, what stays complete If all the world is passing through Show me the seer, show me the true Neti neti... not this, not this Om Shanti, Shanti, Shanti And in my emptiness, a doorway And in my ashes, hidden light The ache that emptied out my hands Was turning them toward the height So I lay my questions at your feet What never dies, what stays complete If all the world is passing through Show me the seer... show me the true What never dies Show me... show me

Child of dawn, unclench your sorrow The world you fear is woven thread The loom is mind, the cloth illusion The weaver wakes, the fear is shed Mind alone builds every prison Mind alone unlocks the door Turn the maker toward the making You were free forevermore Mana eva manushyanam Karanam bandha-mokshayoh (Mind alone is the cause Of bondage and of freedom) Fate is only yesterday's own effort Effort is tomorrow's fate Row, my son — the current answers Your own two hands unlock the gate Mind alone builds every prison Mind alone unlocks the door Turn the maker toward the making You were free forevermore Om Saha Navavatu, Saha Nau Bhunaktu Saha Viryam Karavavahai Tejasvi Nau Adhitam Astu Ma Vidvishavahai Om Shanti Shanti Shanti (May we be protected together, nourished together May we work together with great energy May our study be luminous May there be no discord between us) You are the light the lamp is seeking Tat Tvam Asi... you are That

My love lay still at midnight's border I would not let the lamp go out I called the goddess of the rivers Of speech, to wash away my doubt Come, little queen, leave weight behind you Thought is the only wing you need Your husband dreams a whole creation Inside a single mustard seed Worlds within worlds within a world A palace folded in a room Whatever mind believes completely Becomes the sky, becomes the bloom I flew through ceilings made of aeons I watched him reign, I watched him grieve Each life as real as any other Each real only as we believe Om Aim Saraswatyai Namaha Om Aim Saraswatyai Namaha Space is a thought the thinker opened Time is a thread the dreamer drew The curtain thought has drawn between us Thought can draw open too Worlds within worlds within a world A palace folded in a room Whatever mind believes completely Becomes the sky, becomes the bloom Awake inside the dream Awake... awake

A stranger came into my court With peacock feathers, eyes of smoke He raised a wand of woven horsehair And sixty years passed while he spoke I fell from throne to dust and famine I wed my sorrow, raised my pain I traded rings for one small fire I lost the names I loved to rain A lifetime in a moment A moment holds a life Who stretches time like water The mind, the mind, the mind I woke — the lamp had barely flickered The court still held its indrawn breath Yet down the road my other lifetime Lay real as morning, warm as bread A lifetime in a moment A moment holds a life Who stretches time like water The mind, the mind, the mind If grief can be this deeply dreamt Then so can grace, then so can light The spell that bound me can unbind me The dream runs both ways in the night So Ham... So Ham (Beyond all my lifetimes... I am That) Sixty years... one breath So Ham

I knelt beside the evening water To wash the day from off my hands The surface opened like a doorway And I came up in other lands I wore a life that wasn't mine there Or was it Flesh and salt and years I begged, I feasted, I was crowned there I learned the taste of stranger tears How deep is one immersion How long one held-in breath I lived whole years beneath the surface And rose before the ripples left And when I walked the waking roads The village knew that other name Two worlds, both stitched of the same seeing Two rivers from a single rain Ko Ham? (Who am I?) So Ham (I am That) Ko Ham? So Ham Ko Ham? So Ham Not the roles the river gave me Not the crowns that come and go I am the water, not the wearing The knowing shining through the known How deep is one immersion How long one held-in breath I lived whole years beneath the surface And rose before the ripples left Rise... the ripples close The light remains

I have watched the mountains soften I have seen the oceans trade their beds Suns go out like evening candles And still this one breath rises... rests Kingdoms I have counted thousands Floods and fires, the world re-sown High on the tree at the edge of heaven I keep the nest of the unknown Ride the swan of breath, beloved In... and out... the only road Prana rising, prana falling The wave goes home, the wave goes home Ham Sa Ham-Sa... So Ham So Ham... So Ham (I am That, riding the breath) When the deluge drinks the mountains I fold my wings inside the Om When a new dawn draws the outlines I breathe — and worlds are drawn back home Ride the swan of breath, beloved In... and out... the only road Prana rising, prana falling The wave goes home, the wave goes home In... out Remain

I gave the treasury to beggars I gave the palace to the wind I kept a bowl, a mat, a fire And kept the keeper hid within A young sage found me in the forest With eyes I almost recognized He asked me, "What have you abandoned If you're still the one who's wise" Throw the bowl into the river Let the last possession go Not the mat, not the fire The little "mine," the quiet "no" Tat Tvam Asi — thou art That The gold beyond the gold And when the young sage dropped the veil My teacher wore my lover's face The truth had walked beside me always Patient as dawn, disguised as grace Come home — the crown will not defile you Come home — the world is also true We'll reign with open hands together And freedom will reign through us too Tat Tvam Asi (Tat Tvam Asi) Tat Tvam Asi (Tat Tvam Asi) Om Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Throw the bowl into the river Let the last possession go Not the mat, not the fire The little "mine," the quiet "no" Tat Tvam Asi — thou art That The gold beyond the gold Open hands... open throne Free

One ladder Seven rungs And at the top — no climber left at all A longing wakes before the sunrise A homesick ache for what is true Shubheccha... Shubheccha (The good desire) Now ask the question like a lantern Turn every stone of "I" and "mine" Vicharana... Vicharana (The inquiry) The clouds grow thin, the mind grows quiet Old habits loosen, thread by thread Tanumanasa... Tanumanasa (The thinning of the mind) Climb by resting, rise by releasing Every rung is made of you Seven names for one arriving The sky was always shining through Then being dawns — the first awakening Here the healing garden grows Sattvapatti... Sattvapatti (The dawn of being) Act in the world and wear it lightly Honey on fingers, nothing sticks Asamsakti... Asamsakti (The sweet non-clinging) Now things are light in shapes of things The world one taste of shining mind Padartha-bhavana... Padartha-bhavana (The melting of objects) Beyond the waking, dream and sleeping The fourth, the always, the arrived Turyaga... Turyaga (Abiding in the fourth) Climb by resting, rise by releasing Every rung is made of you Seven names for one arriving The sky was always shining through Shubheccha... Vicharana... Tanumanasa Sattvapatti... Asamsakti... Padartha-bhavana Turyaga Om No rung, no ladder — only sky

A son of Goa crossed the water With one lamp hidden in his coat "The power sleeps within the sleeper No iron wand, no master's stroke" In Bengal courtyards, trance was medicine Hands of the land, names history lost And far away a northern surgeon Read of a yogi's wintered breath Return the river to the mountain Carry the song back to its source The science of the healing whisper Comes home along its oldest course Let it come home... let it come home For every book that kept the treasure And lost the names of those who gave We speak them back into the morning We bring the river to the wave Not to take, and not to tame We lay the science on the altar We bow, and speak the older names Return the river to the mountain Carry the song back to its source The science of the healing whisper Comes home along its oldest course Let it come home... let it come home Loka Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu Loka Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu Loka Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu (May all beings everywhere be happy and free) Home... the river remembers Home

Om I asked you what would never leave me You gave me back my own two eyes The world I feared was my own weaving The weaver woke — the fear untied Now walk the market like a temple Now wear the crown, and wear it light Grief will come — it will not drown you Joy will come — you'll hold it right Peace is not the end of weather It is the sky that holds the storm Not the absence of the aching The aching turned to love's own warmth Yatha drishti, tatha srishti As the seeing, so the seen Free... conscious... happy Awake inside the dream A steady eye that does not grasp A heart that keeps all seasons whole A self worn soft as river linen And kindness watching from the soul We built the worlds and walked their weather We wore the dream and let it go Now every road runs bright with being Above, below, the same one glow Peace is not the end of weather It is the sky that holds the storm Not the absence of the aching The aching turned to love's own warmth Yatha drishti, tatha srishti As the seeing, so the seen Free... conscious... happy Awake inside the dream Om Purnamadah Purnamidam Purnat Purnam Udachyate Purnasya Purnam Adaya Purnam Eva Avashishyate (That is whole, this is whole From wholeness, wholeness arises Take wholeness from wholeness Wholeness alone remains) Sarvam Khalvidam Brahma Om Shanti... Shanti... Shanti Ten billion hearts... one seeing Om