“Perhaps I’ve been telling my tale with more cynicism than intended. I don’t mean to — I wasn’t so much cynical as lost. I should have been found with the touch of your hands, which after all represented the touch of all seekers, all hearts. Instead, I literally died… and was born: for such brutally one-pointed bhakti was the very thing that, under the loving eyes of the zodiac, arranged — ordained — our extraordinary assembly today.
“For seven years, it was hell. No one could have known; such was my art. Like any good counterfeiter, practice makes perfect… While each successive day grew more agonizing than the last, an evolving expertise made it virtually impossible for even a close observer to distinguish false notes from true. What a connoisseur I became! After awhile, even I managed to fool myself. I was a cross between a chimpanzee and a parrot, without the integrity of either. Mind you, I was never contemptuous of the teachings I had retained enough of to pervert and drew comfort from making use of the dirty dishwater that soaked round my teacher’s pots. As time went on, my respect for Father compounded — my awe—as did my self-hatred for having betrayed a sacred trust. The only respite from anguish came in dreamless sleep, but even then—! At night, before losing consciousness, I ruminated that there must be some purpose to it all and if only I persevered I might be pardoned… perhaps even emerge enlightened, worthy of the chair at last. Upon awakening, such fantasies were totally expunged. Again I dove headlong into the daily routine, flogging myself for the guilt I carried and for what I had become. Would you mind very much if we went inside?”
Kura blinked, flustered by a comment outside the narrative.
“I’m mindful of the sun,” said the American. “I’m used to it — but it may sneak up on you.” He gestured amicably toward the cave. “I assure you it’s geologically sound. And Cassiopeia looks as if she’d enjoy some cool water.”
He turned on his heel, marched to the cave and disappeared within. I was intensely curious and absolutely parched — both water bottles were finished, which of course he had thoughtfully noted. I got up but Kura didn’t budge. He just sat there like a robot on the fritz and mopped his brow, a move that never failed to trigger heart attack head-riffs. What if he keeled over right then, without getting closure?
He lifted himself off the stump and shuffled toward the cave. The American’s sandals were at the door. I took mine off and Kura clumsily did the same.
In an ashram, arrogance arrives in bare feet…
Pitch-dark. We stood stock-still inside the entrance while our eyes adjusted. The sadhu gestured for us to sit at the bench of a small wooden table. I led Kura over, afraid he might stumble. Glasses of water and cups of tea were already waiting.
“In my seventh year, something shifted,” said the American. He came and sat across from us. “I began plotting my escape. I was stunned it had never occurred to me. Some part of me believed that if I took definitive action — if I left Mogul Lane behind and threw myself on the mercy of the Source — all crimes would be forgiven. Very Catholic, no? My demeanor brightened with the knowledge I’d begun tunneling beneath the barbed wire. The Great Escape! Can you recall my sunny mood in the months before I departed? Even my enemies — a camp that was steadily growing — noted a jauntiness in my step. I meditated each day for hours, something I hadn’t done in years. My course of action, my destiny became clear. I likened myself to the prisoner who finishes lunch and straightens his cell before leaping from the top tier. Liberation was at hand… all was well with the world at last.
“I plotted that escape as carefully as a murder. The possibility that I might be apprehended by those whose open hearts I had betrayed with my ‘teachings’ was unacceptable. I would not have it! Nothing would be left to chance. In the years I made book I’d become well acquainted with a host of shady characters. I see now why I cultivated those gamblers and thieves — I envied the integrity of their one-pointed purpose. What a brazen, wondrous thing it is to dream of winning by a nose, to stake everything on winning by a nose! However they might be judged, those men could never be robbed of the dignity conferred by that inviolate enterprise, for it came to be my opinion it wasn’t the horse they were straining toward but God Himself. It is said that this is how some escape the Wheel of Dharma—by a nose. With the help of my rogue’s gallery, I made a clean getaway. I loved them all the more for never asking Why? though of course I had a ready answer: Why not! A report on the details of my flight would be superfluous. Suffice to say I was like one of those merchants in 1,001 Nights, snatched by djinns and deposited far away from home. Only a few moments seemed to pass before I found myself hundreds of miles to the north.
“You may not believe this but I had no plan beyond achieving my freedom. I was alone and deliriously without purpose. One day, during charnel ground sadhana13, my nostrils quivered at a whiff of perfume — the intoxicating, unmistakable odor of my teacher! The Great Guru spoke through a cloud of roses and sandalwood. He said the more directionless I became the stronger his scent would grow, until one day I became the scent itself. With that, I began my travels to that place called Nowhere.
“After a decade of wandering, on awakening from an afternoon nap beneath a Tamarisk tree, the pungent smells of my guru at last returned to overwhelm my senses. As I went begging, roadside Samaritans were stunned by my exhalations, redolent with botanical Attar: the field of roses now resided within. I heard his voice a final time, so loud and clear tears gushed from my eyes — tears of essential oils! He told me of a sacred place in Uttar Pradesh, on the apron of Nepal.
“It took months to make my way here. As I ascended the trail, I imagined Father leading me by the hand to my union with the Divine. Halfway up, a man with a thick black moustache (it’s whiter now) appeared on the path. His smile was auspicious. The village elder — you’ve already met, no? I’d hardly spoken in ten years but now the words poured forth. I told him I was an itinerant priest who wished to end his days in solitude and meditation. Without second thought he said, ‘I know just the place.’ He led me through the meadow to this cave, the home of a leper who had passed away a few months before. A vacancy sign was blinking! I’ve spent every day since racing toward emptiness full-gallop, bent on winning by a nose! Only recently did I catch sight of my beloved again. I redoubled my speed and now my guru and I ride together, side by side.”
“Do you mean to say you’ve achieved enlightenment?” said Kura, shaken and wild-eyed. “That you’re an enlightened man?” The American smiled obscurely, agitating Kura even more. “I asked you a question, sir! Did you? Did you or did you not achieve enlightenment!”
There was something so utterly sad and ludicrous about the ultimatum.
“What I am saying,” said the rishi, “is that now I am empty.” He was quiet for some moments, allowing the echo of profundity to die away. “But the important thing to recognize is that I should never have seen the rays of chiti, nor would the veil have lifted… shakti could not have awakened and the words ‘I am that’ would have remained a mere riddle had I not acquired a second guru. Of course, the teacher is always there — it is the seeker who is in the way. What they say is true: When you are ready, the guru will find you. I’ll tell you a concept that is almost impossible to grasp: at the moment one finds one’s guru, one becomes truly lost… until one finds another! For it is only the second guru that allows you to make sense of the first.”