Amrit Sar
Here at the centre of the pool
the Golden Temple checks its mirror
and takes a long bath in the cool.
The gold sun also bathes its face.
Some nights, the moon comes down as well.
Celestial bodies know this place.
The paper kite - a soul has given its soggy face in pink surrender
and floats upon the waves of heaven.
The gold carp in their nibbling school are the blessed residents below,
eating prasad thrown in the pool.
The waves are lit with electric light, yet holy songs emit more current:
kirtan is sung here day and night.
Each pilgrim, family husband, wife
bathe each day for health and wealth,
bathe for everlasting life.
Yet, who bathes inside the mind?
who scrubs down to the spotless self?
The inner pool is hard to find.
2. Remembering the Gullughara
At the Gateway
Here above the gate of Hari Mandir,
fashioned by gold artisans with mallets
I still see Guru Nanak and Bhai Mardana.
The Guru is a gateway wrought in gold,
outliving bursts from gun and mortar-blast.
Sikh militants taught an army to be bold.
Commando boots and bullets could not take away the peace enduring at this place.
Today, the pool's unruffled as a lake
and Hari Mandir's mirrored look of grace reflects the first serenity.
I stand in awe, thinking no one regime, or caste or race
has the permanent power to repress a path of love.
Humanity bows again in its millions to the Formlessness
that carved this golden gateway to One God.
3. The Bridge Across the Pool
From 2am until the evening's over, shoulders jostle into Hari Mandir;
thousands concentrate their prayer, their power.
All come to bow their heads, and ask and then to offer.
This final bridge steadies hungry souls above the water shadowy with fish;
our hopes and wishes flicker their gold scales.
Beneath the naked feet, the holy waters wash.
This marble bridge can bless each man and woman
through cloth and bucket mopping their own grime,
as Sri Guru Granth on a palanquin
offers hands to lift and reach for the sublime.
The body is ones bridge supporting this so-troubled life
each soul inborn to cross. Bow down, practice, take it into your house.
The heart is the Hari Mandir of the cosmos.
The Guru is the bridge across the water
like a sentence that completes the tale;
the Guru is the door that all may enter
when fingers walk with faith along the worn brass rail.
4. Inside Hari Mandir, 1854 (A watercolour by William Carpenter)
Now look inside the navel of the earth:
here a scripture had its holy birth.
Winter shawls keep warm and each white turban has sat since 2am.
Four doors are open. Rababi art depicts the Guru's Word;
the art of praise flies upward like a bird.
Four strings vibrate, music has no end
as singing soars and longs to meet the Friend.
The rababi plucks his tun-wood instrument-
round in belly, carved and elegant.
Resonating deep, the gut-twine strings
support each shabad this rababi sings.
Music service starts with Bhai Mardana:
his lineage became a new gharana.
Yes, they've all sat since the Guru's day
with rabab jory, kartals and bells
and they could sing the monsoon from a rainy raga,
unlocking shabads through sur-sadhan.
This art of bhakti only rare ones know;
when shaped with raag and taal, deep faith can flow.
Sound rebounds off marble, leaves no trace,
yet permeates these walls' mosaic space.
If music is our God,
then let's live on at Hari Mandir Sahib, shrine of song.
A mother and her child have had their darshan
and a sparrow comes for crumbs just like a man.
This is what the English painter saw - the art of worship in 1854.
Chris Mooney Singh
[email protected]
