"The toucan died," he once told me,
"but its soul is advanced and will soon take on a human incarnation."
Multi-colored rug segments covered the stairs to the loft, where a
larger-than-life Transcendental stared down from the slanted ceiling,
directly over his bed.
And there was the problem that Stony Brook disciples learned
the language of spirituality and of dreams less from Chinmoy than Atmananda.
Able to speak at length about anything and nothing, Atmananda often did.
For him, reality seemed to consist of an infinite number of levels
which were interconnected in obvious and in not so obvious ways.
"Words are used to describe these levels but are extremely limited,"
he explained. Nonetheless, I often found myself tripping on his
words from the world of the bizarre to the world of the sensible,
and back again. I became familiar with the diversity of his language
during his lectures and, perhaps more so, during his parties.
"Auuuuummmmmmmmmmmmm," he chanted after a twenty-five minute meditation
at the start of one party. He slowly bowed and touched his forehead
to the floor which is where he sat, along with the rest of us.
Then the Stony Brook disciples stoked the fireplace, set the tablecloth
on the floor, grated cheese, and emptied bags of tortilla chips.
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