This is the hymn I call “The Amazing Grace of Sanskrit,” filled with devotional longing. It is
the one devotional song I have memorized, not so much from effort as from love. I begin to
sing the familiar words in Sanskrit, from the simple introduction about the sacred teachings of
Yoga to the rising tones of worship (“I adore the cause of the universe... I adore the one
whose eyes are the sun, the moon and fire... you are everything to me, O god of gods.. .”)
to the last gemlike summation of all faith (“This is perfect, that is perfect, if you take the per-
fect from the perfect, the perfect remains”).
The women finish singing. They bow in silence, then move out a side door across a dark
courtyard and into a smaller temple, barely lit by one oil lamp and perfumed with incense. I
follow them. The room is filled with devotees—Indian and Western—wrapped in woolen
shawls against the predawn cold. Everyone is seated in meditation, roosted there, you might
say, and I slip in beside them, the new bird in the flock, completely unnoticed. I sit cross-
legged, place my hands on my knees, close my eyes.
I have not meditated in four months. I have not even thought about meditating in four
months. I sit there. My breath quiets. I say the mantra to myself once very slowly and deliber-
ately, syllable by syllable.
Om.
Na.
Mah.
Shi.
Va.
Ya.
Om Namah Shivaya.