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Picture it. The grove stands hushed, the kadamba leaves unstirring, and Śyāma is exactly as He is always painted: the youthful Cupid of Vṛndāvana, Madana Himself, the very form of conquest. When His flute lifts its song, hundreds of gopīs squirm where they stand like deer struck by arrows, hearts spilling from their owners. When He turns His eyes upon the daughters of Vraja, they are undone, helpless under the sweetness. He is the unconquered one, the hero who slays every defense the heart of Vraja ever raised against Him.

And then She glances.

O the wonder of it. Śrī Rādhikā lifts Her eyes, just once, from beneath those lashes, and a single slender arrow flies from the very corner of Her sight. Watch now what becomes of the conqueror. That flute, veṇuḥ, that flute which has emptied a thousand hearts, loses all its power in an instant and falls, nipatitaḥ, slipping from His fingers, karāt, into the dust. He does not even feel it go. The peacock feather, śikhaṇḍaṁ, that unique hallmark of all the Vraja pastimes, the ornament by which the whole world knows Him, the crest that enchants every lovely girl of the cowherd country, loosens, skhalitaṁ, and tumbles and rolls in the dust of the village paths. And the pīta-vasanaṁ, the yellow cloth that lies upon His dark body like a steady stroke of lightning held inside a thundercloud, like a line of gold drawn fresh from a whetstone, the cloth that steals the very pride of the well-born girls of Vraja, slips loose from His waist and falls away, bhraṣṭaṁ. The Prince of the cowherds, vraja-rāja-sūnoḥ, struck through the heart by one look, vimūrcchitasya, swoons.

O how the tradition delights to set this beside the battlefield. A hero at war may cut down a hundred soldiers and never stagger; but let one greater hero, one mahā-vīra, strike him with a single arrow, and that hero faints, his bow falls, his crown rolls off, his armor comes undone. So it is here. Kṛṣṇa can make hundreds of gopīs faint with His glances, but against the supreme heroine, the mahā-vīrā Śrī Rādhā, He has no defense at all. His ordinary look fells the gopīs as arrows fell deer; one look from Her, and the archer Himself lies fallen. Whose glance, then, is the mightier? Whose love is the greater power in all of Vraja? The answer rolls in the dust beside the peacock feather.

There is some secret potency in the outer edge of Her eye, the tradition marvels: kibā mantra-śakti dhare, as if these arrows from Her sidelong glance held a special mantra-power, for see how the feather drops and the cloth gives way as though spells were loosed from the corner of Her sight. And let no one mistake this for weakness in Him. This is the highest glory He keeps for Her alone. He who is Himself ānanda incarnate, the very form of transcendental bliss, has fainted away from one single glance of His Beloved, and there is no greater confession of love than that swoon. The jewel of all lovers, nāgarendra-maṇi, the son of Nanda, lies struck by hundreds of Her enchanting arrow-glances and does not even know His flute has slipped from His hand. The force of love itself brings this ecstasy upon Him. He who upholds the worlds lets Himself be felled by Her; He who needs nothing chooses to need only Her look. She is the one who stuns even Madana-Mohana, the enchanter of Cupid, by piercing and seizing His very heart.

Now begins the sweetest turn of all, the turn that is the whole reason a heart longs to be born in Vraja. Śrīmatī is distressed. Her Prāṇeśvarī heart cannot bear that Priyatama lies fainted at Her feet. She tries this way and that to bring Him back to life, and nothing succeeds. And so She does the most tender thing of all: She takes shelter of Her maidservant. "O sakhi," Svāminī says, "I could not remove My beloved's swoon; will you not see what you can do?" And here, O fortunate heart, here the rasika service of the rasikā maidservant begins. To revive the Nāgara, the sakhi lifts a sweet love-song, the very one that Svāminī once taught her in a cave of Govardhana Hill, and the melody Śrīmatī Herself gave her draws Śyāma back across the threshold of the swoon into open eyes. And when His eyes open, the sweet pastimes of the divine Couple begin to flower.

O think what blessedness pours upon that maidservant. She it was who sang Him back. She it is who stands ready when the love-play has run its course, fanning the divine Pair in the warm hush of the bower, bringing Them cool water, offering betel-leaves rolled and ready, lifting fresh flower-garlands over Their joined forms. She asks nothing of the rasa itself. She asks only to serve at its very edge, and that edge is the highest heaven a heart can know. This is what the longing reaches toward: not to be Kṛṣṇa, not even to be Rādhā, but to be the one whose hands and whose song serve the love of the Two, in the forest-bowers, nikuñja-kānane, with deep attachment, anurāge.

And there is a deeper sweetness folded into that single word rasena, "with rasa." For raso vai saḥ, declare the Upaniṣads: the Supreme is taste itself, mellow itself. So when this heart cries "let me serve Her with rasa," it whispers also: let me serve Her together with Kṛṣṇa, who is rasa made flesh, transcendental mellow personified, the Two of Them braided into one sweetness that I may attend forever. To serve Rādhā is to serve Her with Him, for Her joy is His nearness and His life is Her glance.

Then, as suddenly as it came, the transcendental revelation lifts. The grove fades, the swoon and the song dissolve, and Śrīpāda is left standing in the plain ache of longing, hands empty and heart full, asking the only question worth asking. Tāṁ rādhikāṁ paricarāmi kadā rasena. When, O when, will I serve that Rādhikā with rasa? Not "will I see Her," not "will I have Her," but "will I serve Her, paricarāmi." The whole heaven of this poem lives in that humble verb.