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Begin at the gray edge of the morning, when Vraja is still cool and the cookfires have not yet been lit. It is barely seven o'clock. From Her parental home, or from Yāvat where the family of Her would-be husband Abhimanyu waits, Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī sets out on foot toward Nandīśvara. She has been summoned. Every day Mother Yaśodā calls Her to come and cook for Kṛṣṇa, because long ago, from the sage Durvāsā, this Girl received a boon: whatever Her hands prepare lengthens the life, brightens the health, and deepens the sweetness of the one who eats it. So She is called Amṛta-pāṇi, the One whose hands turn all things into nectar. O Rādhe, even Your fingertips are a blessing on the food of the world.

She arrives at Nandīśvara and lowers Herself before Her elders, touching their feet, and then She slips into the kitchen. And here Mother Yaśodā cannot hold back her love. She sprinkles Śrīmatī with tears and blesses Her aloud: "O moon-faced one, may You live a hundred years and never leave my eyes. O Rādhe, You are Lakṣmī herself walked into my house. Your glance falls on my storerooms and they overflow; nothing is ever lacking; take whatever You need." And Mother Rohiṇī blesses Her too: "Daughter, You are the finest cook of all; make whatever pleases You." At Rohiṇī's praise Svāminī drops Her head in shyness, and tender Rohiṇī settles Her on a golden seat draped in white cloth near the stove, where the fire is fed with cedar, aloe, and pinewood, and a maidservant stands ready to place each ingredient into Her hand as She calls for it.

Now watch Her work. Sometimes She leans to see if the flame is climbing well. Sometimes She lifts a lid to test whether the dish is done. Sometimes She scatters a pinch of spice; sometimes She stirs slowly with a long spoon. And as She moves, the three soft lines on Her belly fold and shift, Her breasts and arms and shoulders sway, and an unrivalled sweetness pours off Her. This is the first line of the verse made flesh: nava-yauvana-udaya-mahā-lāvaṇya-līlamayam: the freshly dawning youth, the great loveliness, all of it playful, all of it ease. There is no strain in Her. Even Her labor is play. The Rādhāvallabha singers name this same glory plainly in their Hindi: She who in the rising hour of Her new youth is wrapped in the most wondrous play of beauty.

Meanwhile, in another quarter of Nandīśvara, Śyāmasundara has finished His bath. He is dressed. He goes into His bhajana-kuṭīra, His meditation chamber, and there, of all things, He sits to chant the name of Rādhā and to turn the Rādhā-mantra over and over in His heart. Think of it. He is the embodiment of bliss itself, and yet He does japa of a Girl's name as His chosen deity, certain that by calling Her she will appear. Premamayī Rādhā is His one desired deity. His heart begins to stir. The desire to see Her rises and rises until He can bear no delay. The tradition gives Him faltering words on the road, in the old pada of Harivallabha: tuyā patha cāi, "rāi" "rāi" boli: He looks down the road, He says "Rāi, Rāi" with a broken voice, and a single instant of waiting He counts as millions of ages. He cannot meditate on Her any longer without going to find Her. So He rises and walks toward the kitchen.

And He peeps through the kitchen window. There She is. O the sweetness of it. Her veil has slipped crooked from the heat and the effort. Her dress and Her ornaments have loosened from honest work. Her face has caught a reddish glow from the burning fire, and this is the saffron-gold the verse names, kāśmīra-gaura-cchabi: the golden complexion of fresh saffron, here kindled even warmer by the flame. Pearl-like beads of sweat stand on Her cheeks and only beautify Her more. And Śyāma, beholding the very form He had just been meditating upon, cannot move His feet. They will not lift from where He stands; pādau padaṁ na calatas tava pāda-mūlāt, the tradition says, His feet will not take a single step away from the place where She is. His eyes widen and widen with ecstasy. He has found, awake and in the body, the One He was reaching for in trance.

Then Svāminī sees Him. In one breath shyness floods Her, and She cannot even reach up to straighten the veil on Her head. Instead She scolds Her maidservant with a single flash of Her eyes: "Did you not see Him? Why did you not tell Me He was watching Me?" And the kiṅkarī, the handmaiden, answers only with her eyes: "I did not see Him either; I was lost in grinding the paste." But this is a sweet conspiracy. She had seen Kṛṣṇa come. Our dark Hero had silently begged her not to warn Svāminī, so that He might drink His fill of Her unguarded loveliness a moment longer.

Here the second line opens its meaning: sāndrānanda-ghana-anurāga-ghaṭita-śrī-mūrti-sammohanam. The tradition reads sāndrānanda as Śrī Kṛṣṇa Himself, the thickened mass of bliss, and tells us His very form is fashioned out of passionate love for Rādhā, the way a golden earring is studded all over with diamonds. The Vaiṣṇava-toṣaṇī commentary on the Bhāgavata, at the tenth canto, fourteenth chapter, says it gently: this formless bliss took a form and became the friend of the people of Vraja, the very object of their love, like beautiful gold that has become a lovely ornament, manoramaṁ suvarṇam idaṁ kuṇḍalaṁ jātam itivat. And once made of gold, He is set with the diamonds of His longing for Her. So now ponder the wonder. He is bliss; He is the spell that enchants all worlds; and yet Her sweet form enchants Him. The Rādhāvallabha reading says it from the other side and means the same: this form, woven of thickened bliss and dense love, casts its full spell upon Śrī Lāl-jī. The enchanter stands enchanted at a kitchen window. That is sammohanam.

Kṛṣṇa thinks, watching, "Ah, how much trouble She is taking to cook for Me. Her face has gone rosy with the heat of the fire, kāśmīra-gaura-cchabi. Her maidservants are wiping the sweat from Her cheeks." Their eyes meet, and with a glance Svāminī sends Him a message: "Mother Rohiṇī is here. Go now." His eyes ask, "Then will I not see You again?" And Hers, blinking, promise, "Yes. You will."

When the cooking is done, the kiṅkarīs change Her clothes, wipe Her hands and feet and limbs with a moist towel, and begin to fan Her. Dhaniṣṭhā brings a glass of nectar-syrup: "Dear friend, drink." And as Svāminī sips the sweet drink, which the maidservants have secretly touched to Kṛṣṇa's lips first, She closes Her eyes. Then they offer Her a pān.

Now Kṛṣṇa sits down with His family to eat. Svāminī draws Her veil low across Her forehead and hands the dishes one by one to Mother Rohiṇī to be served. And the moment He sees Her serving, Kṛṣṇa is undone again. His appetite drains away. Mother Yaśodā grows anxious, watching her son lose interest in the food. She coaxes Him: "Look, Gopāla. Rohiṇī and Rādhikā have cooked all this for You. I brought Rādhikā here specially to cook for You. But if You will not eat, Rāi will not come anymore." And at that, for Rāi's sake alone, Kṛṣṇa stuffs Himself to the throat with the food Her hands have made.

Shyly Svāminī comes into the dining hall, head bowed, for Balarāma and Mother Yaśodā are present. She blushes, and the kiṅkarī sees that blush, too, as the saffron-gold of the verse, kāśmīra-gaura-cchabi once more, this time the gold of a maiden's modesty. Her bangles and anklets ring softly as she carries the full trays in and bears the empty ones back out. And in some unseen way Śyāmasundara keeps finding angles to look at Her face, and Svāminī keeps finding ways to steal a look at His, past Mother Rohiṇī, while She hands over the dishes. "Ah, how beautiful is My beloved," He thinks, and through the very rice and vegetables He is tasting the touch of Her hands upon the food. The tradition sings it through Śrīla Yadunandana Ṭhākura: Kṛṣṇa relishes the food cooked by Rādhikā as if it were nectar, and blissfully sends out His bee-like eyes to drink the honey of Rāi's lotus face; and Rādhikā sends out the channels of Her own glances to gather the nectar of Kṛṣṇa's beauty; and seeing the sweetness of His face, the fair One no longer knows anything at all, lost in the rush of joy.

And as Their four eyes meet across that crowded room, They are remembering. They are remembering last night's games in the bowers of Vṛndāvana, vṛndāraṇya-nikuñja-keli-lalitam: the elegant play of the forest groves. In a single second Their bee-eyes drink every drop of honey from each other's faces, and within that meeting of glances They pray to each other, for love, and for another blissful tryst to come. Consoled by Her, His appetite returns, and He eats. She has pacified Him.

When the men have finished, Mother Yaśodā takes Svāminī by the hand and makes Her swear to sit and eat. "Why will You not eat a little? Do You think I am other than Your own mother? In my house You may laugh, joke, sleep, and eat exactly as You do in Kīrtidā's house. Before whom should You feel shy?" Then Yaśodā sits close and feeds Her with her own hand. But Śrī Rādhikā eats nothing except the sacred remnants of Kṛṣṇa's own meal, so clever Dhaniṣṭhā has quietly mixed those remnants into the very dishes Yaśodā is lovingly placing in Her mouth. O the tenderness, that even Her eating is His prasāda.

And when Svāminī has rinsed Her mouth and made ready to return to far Yāvat, Mother Yaśodā will not let Her go without an ache. The tradition gives us her words. O my precious little one, she says, crest-jewel of all chaste girls, rest a while in happiness; it is not yet late; play a little with Your friends; take camphor and betel. Your beauty, Your qualities, Your every doing soothe my heart, and I dream of them even in my sleep. Then her love spills into grief: my heart breaks to wonder why Fate would not give me a daughter who is an ocean of virtues like You. Let a thunderbolt fall on the head of the Creator for arranging things so. What wrong did I do to be left without a daughter like You? In all this land I cannot find a girl fit to marry my boy as You would be. And hearing Yaśodā's sorrow, Vṛṣabhānu's daughter laughs a soft, naughty laugh and hides Her smile behind Her veil, and both of them float away on a single nectar-stream of motherly love, their bodies studded with thrilled goosebumps, their mouths unable to make a sound for the fullness of joy.

Then Mother Yaśodā sprinkles Śrīmatī once more with loving tears and with the very milk of her motherly breast, and as she does, a golden effulgence gushes from Svāminī's limbs. And the handmaiden, watching, understands the final line of the verse at last, understands it not as a doctrine but as a thing she has just seen with her own eyes: śrī-govinda iva vrajendra-gṛhiṇī-premaika-pātraṁ mahaḥ. Exactly, precisely, in the same full measure that the Queen of Vraja loves her own Govinda, so she loves this golden Girl, the one whom both Yaśodā and Kīrtidā, the mothers of Vraja, cherish as their single vessel of love. There are not two loves in Yaśodā's heart, a larger one for her son and a smaller for the Daughter. There is one love, and Rādhā is its other equal vessel. So the old singers close the verse: an effulgent goddess of saffron and golden luster dwells in the bowers of Vraja and makes the prince of Vraja, who is bliss itself personified, helplessly attached to Her; and Śrī Sarasvatī sings that Rāi's form illumines all of Vrajamaṇḍala, day and night. Then the vision fades, the kiṅkarī returns to the outer world, and from the depth of her servant-heart she can only cry, "All glories to that golden light named Śrī Rādhā." Jaya jaya: the saffron-gold, indescribable light of Vraja, may it triumph forever.