What is this Gopi prem (the Divine love of the Gopis) that you and I, we all need to practice?
तर झरसी (झुरसी), ऊपर गरी, कज्जल-जल छिरकाइ।
पिय पाती बिन ही लिखी, बाँची बिरह-बलाइ॥Tar jharasī (jhurasī), ūpar garī, kajjal-jal chhirakāi.
Piya pātī bin hī likhī, bānchī birah-balāi.- Bihari Lal, Bihari Satsai (17th Century)
A Gopi took a piece of paper in hand and wanted to write something. But this Gopi is absolutely illiterate. She doesn’t know how to sign a name. How can she write a letter? Holding the paper, she is very, very seriously thinking what to do. And she enters into this ecstatic state where her entire body is horripilating, shaking, shivering. The temperature of viraha (the pain of separation from the Beloved), the fire of separation, is burning so much in her heart that her whole body is set on fire. Literally, she is burning. The temperature is so high.
The tears are rushing down her cheeks. Big, big drops of tears are coming, washing away the collyrium. The collyrium is the kājal (black eye cosmetic) that she had applied to her eyes. This Gopi, holding the piece of paper, does not know what to do. She has entered into samadhi (deep meditative absorption), into roopdhyan (meditation on the Divine form), into prem samadhi of Krishna, thinking of Shree Krishna when He had gone to Mathura (the city Krishna went to after leaving Braj) .
So Gopi’s tears are running down. Hot, hot tears (come) in virah, cold, cold tears (come) in union. This is virah; this is separation. So hot, hot tears like acid are dropping. Hot tears, washing the collyrium, are falling on the paper which she is holding. That is tar jharasī (तर झरसी). Down below, where she was holding the paper, it’s all burnt due to her body temperature - virah temperature. And it has left the burnt mark of her fingerprints. And the tears that had rolled, washing away the collyrium, have fallen on the top of this paper. It has melted the paper over there. There are bumps created. In some places, it’s even torn. And the collyrium marks are everywhere, splashed everywhere on the paper.
And then the Gopi becomes conscious. And somebody was leaving for Mathura very soon. He’d be gone. So quickly the Gopi folds the paper, not realizing what’s happening. And she gives it to this person to hand it over to Shree Krishna in Mathura. The person takes it. And Shree Krishna opens the letter, and He reads it. How could He read when nothing was written? Because of the burnt marks of the fingerprints. He knows the temperature of virah. And the tears that had melted the paper and the collyrium that had washed, it’s not any water. It is the collyrium and Krishna can see the virah of the Gopi.
The pangs of separation, the fire of separation. The temperature is so high. This Gopi is so desperate. In her longing, in her love for her Divine Beloved Krishna, she could not give to anyone to write the letter. Because this is something so personal, so very personal.
Thus, Shree Krishna read the Prem of the Gopi.
This is Gopi Prem.
This is how personal and how intimate our heart’s love for our Beloved should be. It’s very pure. It’s nothing to do with physical. It’s all with our soul (and) our sole Beloved.
He is seated within us. He is nowhere else. He is seated within us.
But to drink the Divine love, we have to bring the form out. The milk of the cow in the udder of the cow is of no use. When it is milked out and then the calf is made to drink that milk, it makes it healthy.
Likewise, the Lord in our hearts is not available for us. We don’t have Him. We don’t remember Him.
So we have Him in the form outside and then bring Him in again and remind yourself of His presence all the time, consciously, that He is with me. My protector is watching me.
And have the deep love of your heart for Him all the time.
This is Gopi Prem (the Divine love of the Gopis).
