Vṛndāvana Bhajana
Written by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami in 1958,
Published December of that Year in Gauḍīya Patrika,
The Magazine of the Gauḍīya Vedānta Samiti.
Verse 1.
I am sitting alone in Vṛndāvana-dhāma
In this mood I am getting many realizations.
I have my wife, sons, daughters, grandsons, everything,
But I have no money so they are a fruitless glory.
Kṛṣṇa has shown me the naked form of material nature,
By his strength it has all become tasteless to me today.
yasyāham anugṛhṇāmi hariṣye tad-dhanaṁ śanaiḥ
“I gradually take away all the wealth of those upon whom I am merciful.”
How was I able to understand this mercy of the All-merciful?
Verse 2.
Everyone has abandoned me, seeing me as penniless,
Wife, relatives, friends, brothers, everyone.
This is misery, but it gives me a laugh. I sit alone and laugh.
In this māyā-saṁsāra, whom do I really love?
Where have all my loving father and mother gone to now?
And where are all my elders, who were my own folk?
Who will give me news of them, tell me who?
All that is left of this family life is a list of names.
Verse 3.
Like the froth on the sea water mixes again in the sea,
Māyā’s saṁsāra’s play is just like that.
No one is mother or father, or personal relative,
Just like the sea-foam they remain but a short time,
Just as the froth on sea water mixes again in the sea,
The body made of five elements meets with destruction.
How many bodies does the embodied soul take in this way;
His relatives are all simply related to this temporal body.
Verse 4.
But everyone is your relative, brother? on the spiritual platform.
This relationship is not tinged with the smell of māyā.
The Supreme Lord is the soul of everyone,
In relation to Him, everyone in the universe is the same.
All your relatives, brother! All the billions of jīvas.
When seen in relation to Kṛṣṇa they are all in harmony.
Forgetting Kṛṣṇa, the jīva desires for sense gratification,
And as a result he is firmly grasped by māyā.
