2002 / february / 12
like bad news 'bout a long lost friend
mail from a friend today, who is in Pune right now, in the ashram that i spent
three months in a couple of years ago.
she's early thirties, just one year older than me, but she's been 'in' for ten years.
while i was a student, full of naive pretensions and genuine enthousiasm about
politics and art, she plunged into commune life. at least five times she spent an entire
half year there. she *knows* the place. then i got this mail today.
it read like poetry: straight from the heart. no punctuation, no capitals -
powerful and distressing.
"there are rules for everything," she wrote. "for work. for jumping in. for
the music in the buddha hall.
"rules, rules, rules.
"it's not
allowed to sing songs with Osho's name in it. Or even the word Master.
And it seems like all his photographs are gone.
"i never knew i would say this, but i'm spending a lot of time outside...
and i think this might be the last time.
"well, everything must pass, i guess."
and i'm thinking, i was afraid of this. i've been thinking of that ashram,
sometimes wondering how it would be to go there again. but i knew it was
turning into a church already when i was there. dogma's set in stone,
new editions of books with key parts omitted or rewritten.
Osho left his body twelve
years ago now. that is a long time ago.
and i believe that he is around, his presence, like one of the many
faces of god, to help us all.
but the sannyasin organisation is run by people, and even when he was
still around, it derailed spectacularly in oregon in 1985.
to keep a movement pure, you need
people who are intensely honest, maybe not enlightened, but of Mandela
statue at least, at the helm.
Here i am writing this, trying to bring to words what i feel, and instead i
go into analysis and damnit, what can i say. nothing. but i know, love
and respect the friend who wrote me today, and i'm deeply touched, as
i was cherishing a memory as if it would be possible to go back someday.
and it has shattered. and i cry for a place of silence and meditation
which brought light in this world, that seems to have fallen to the dark.
yes, everything must pass, but it can be sad to see it go.
