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Beloved Mother,
This morning, early, I
went to church - to pray for Sara.
All the people there were thinking of
Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and
suddenly I thought of you. Your dear
face, and your loving look, and your
white sari, and your bracelets. It
was all there. And it seemed to me
that yours was the presence that was
to soothe and bless poor S. Sara's
sickroom.
And - do you know? - I thought I had
been very foolish to sit in your room,
at the evening service to Sri
Ramakrishna, trying to meditate. Why
did I not understand that it was quite
enough to be a little child at your
dear feet?
Dear Mother! You are full of love!
And it is not a flushed and violent
love, like ours, and like the world's,
but a gentle peace that brings good to
everyone and wishes ill to none. It
is a golden radiance, full of play.
What a blessed Sunday that was, a few
months ago, when I ran in to you, the
last thing before I went on the
Ganges, and ran back to you for a
moment, as soon as I came back! I
felt such a wonderful freedom in the
blessing you gave me, and in your
welcome home!
Dearest Mother - I wish we could send
you a wonderful hymn, or a prayer.
But somehow even that would seem too
loud, too full of noise! Surely you
are the most wonderful thing of God
– Sri
Ramakrishna's own chalice of His Love
for the world - a token left with His
children, in these lonely days, and we
should be very still and quiet before
you - except indeed for a little fun!
Surely the “wonderful things of God”
are all quiet -- stealing unnoticed
into our lives - the air and the
sunlight and the sweetness of gardens
and of the Ganges. These are the
silent things that are like you!
Do send to poor S. Sara the mantle of
your peace. Isn't your thought, now
and then, of the high calm that
neither loves nor hates? Isn't that a
sweet benediction that trembles in
God, like the dew-drop on the
lotus-leaf, and touches not the world?
Ever, my darling Mother, your foolish
KHOOKI (baby),
Nivedita
(A letter from Sister Nivedita to the
Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi, as
published in “A Short Life of The Holy
Mother” by Swami Pavitrananda, Advaita
Ashrama, Kolkata.)
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