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In this game of love don’t think that you can take a trick.
To begin with, the cards are stacked, then the play is slick.
All right. You get a good hand—and your partner dumps you;
Or you find that a card you held suddenly trumps you!
Switch the figure to cricket—our Master’s other favorite game—
You go in to defend your wicket—and return after one ball in shame.
It’s just no go. Whatever you do, the call or the ball
Defeats you. The Beloved is all in all.
But one still has to play the game—rich man, poor man, politician, thief,
You can’t just sit down in inaction on government relief.
The point is, you are an idiot if you expect to win.
There’s only a razor-edge difference between goodness and sin.
That is heaven which you do for your Beloved, and do well;
What you do for yourself closes round you as a prison cell.
The wheel of existence rolls on like the old fortune telling game “tinker, tailor soldier sailor”. But you can’t take refuge in the ‘secret glades’ of the last poem. You have to engage in the game with all its chances and uncertainties. There is only one real rule, to play it for the Beloved. Baba enjoyed both cards and cricket. No good being glum about being in the game of living.
The difference between good and evil is sharp and destructive if you are playing by morality rules. Surrender to His rule is the sure guide. Then you are not plagued by razor sharp differences but just do your best for the Beloved.