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Begin inside the bower, O seeker, on the afternoon a quarrel turned the whole world tender. Śrīmatī had grown proud. Her māna rose; She scolded; She would not be reasoned with; and at last She put Śyāmasundara out of Her kuñja with Her own displeasure. Hear, though, what the old teachers say of that anger: it does not drive Him off. It draws Him. Rādhā's love makes the king of relishers relish even the sweetness of Her pique. Her stubbornness, Her proud rebuke, Her unreasonable refusals, every one of them is done for His pleasure, and He drinks them like rare wine. The tradition fixes it in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta, in the Antya-līlā, that when His beloved is cross with Kṛṣṇa and rebukes Him, it satisfies Him and makes Him glad; Her māna keeps such fitting proportions that He has only the smallest trouble to coax Her out of it. So when He let Himself be pushed from the bower, He went only to taste Her love from a new angle. He did not go far. He hid.

Now picture the bower after He is gone. The pride has spent itself, and what is left is emptiness. Śrīmatī turns to Her girlfriends and begs them to bring Śyāma back. But the sakhīs tease Her: "Rādhe, You Yourself threw Him out; how shall we now go and call Him back? Do not fret, Your own pure love will draw Him to You by itself. And if You cannot wait, send someone else to fetch Him, for we who put Him out cannot be the ones to bring Him in." Hearing this, Śrīmatī turns to the maidservant who stands at Her side gently fanning Her, and orders her to go and find Kṛṣṇa and lead Him home. The dāsī fixes Svāminī's lotus feet in her heart and slips out at once into the groves to search.

And here is the secret of His hiding, O seeker: He waits unseen on purpose, to relish the sincere eagerness of this maidservant. Her face is a clear mirror, reflecting back exactly what Svāminī feels, every flicker of joy, every shade of sorrow; so that from his hiding-place Śyāma can read Rādhikā's whole anxiety written plainly on the servant's anxious face. This is why every ornament now comes pouring out of the maidservant's mouth, one after another, as she calls into the trees. She is naming everything she loves so that He will show Himself.

Listen to her first cry. "O Rādhānātha! O lordly swan that loves to swim in the deep, fathomless nectar-lake of Rādhikā's heart, that agādha-rasa where alone You float as the blessed rājahaṁsa, Nanda's son! If my Svāminī cannot meet You, the whole world is hollow for Her. How can You stay so indifferent? Show Yourself, only show Yourself, to this wretched maidservant!" Then she names the flute. "O Rādhānātha, the nectar-stream of Your flute-song is a magic potion that enchants all the gopīs. Why do You go on hiding, when with that very flute resting clear in Your beautiful handpalm You could undo any proud girl's huff in a moment? It pours the very quality of nectar into the ear, at every step, without ceasing." She names the head. "A restless peacock feather wiggles upon Your hair and trembles at every step You take." She names the ears and the throat. "You wear earrings, the nicely-made crown-ornament that the beloved gopī fashioned, and a dangling string of fresh guñjā-beads that some loving girl strung for You with her own hands. These plain forest jewels can enchant Śrī Rādhā and all Her friends; let You once reveal that sweet form and all their pride dissolves at a single glance."

And here the maidservant reaches for the deepest reason of all, which the tradition draws from the Lalita-Mādhava, in its seventh act. There, Rādhikā dwells in the new Vṛndāvana-garden of Dvārakā, burning in separation, and Nava Vṛndā and Bakulā press Her to go and meet the Lord of Dvārakā in His royal majesty. But Śrīmatī refuses outright: "yasyottaṁsaḥ sphurati cikure keki-piñcha-praṇīto": My mind does not accept any form of Hari, however supremely beautiful in all the universe, if it has no crown of peacock feathers in the hair, no garland of big guñjā-beads at the throat, no flute lifted to the lips. See what this means, O seeker. She refuses God in His grandeur. She will not have the gold of Dvārakā. Her heart opens only for the cowherd boy in his simple village marks; the highest sweetness lives not in majesty but in the gopa with the flute. So the maidservant, knowing exactly which form alone can draw Her mistress back to life, cries her last cry: "O King of relishers, O support of Rādhā's very life, come to me in that form, in that and no other!"

The same adoration runs in the songs the tradition sets beside this verse. Nanda's son is a blessed lordly swan in the deep rasa-lake of Rādhikā's heart, ever cradling in His lovely handpalm the bamboo flute that fills the ears with nectar-rasa. He wears the peacock-feather crown upon His head, a necklace of nine jewels at His breast, and beautiful new earrings that Rādhā fashioned with Her own hands, and it is just this, made by Her hands, that makes Him the more praiseworthy. And the closing song carries Prabodhānanda's own name: that king of relishers, Śyāma, with the dangling guñjā-string that brightens the whole forest, will yet delight my eyes by revealing Himself to me. Even in the Rādhāvallabha reading the verse is headed simply Abhilāṣā, longing: ah, that He who is the swan of Rādhā's fathomless heart-lake, the flute in whose hand drips the nectar-quality of bliss step by step, the head crowned with the trembling peacock-moon, the ears bright with ornaments the loving girls made, the throat lit by the glowing guñjā-cluster, that rasika-mauli may surely, surely, meet me.