There are hardly any road signs
In the wonderland called Auroville.
It is a utopian global township, the conduit of an ideal –
To live in collaborative collective harmony.
The residents here learn on their own and at their own pace –
To accept and respect the divinity in all human beings. Progress achieved here symbolizes humanity’s deepest aspirations,
Truth and Harmony once sought by Akhnaton and his Queen Nefertiti.
Auroville is a Karmabhumi to those with an inner calling –
Offering integrally all that they are, for what they can be.
It is the Yagna of their individual ideas and ideals, efforts and expertise,
A consecration of their mental, vital, and physical consciousnesses.
It is an odyssey of psychological metamorphosis –
Each becoming the harbinger of a new Dawn.
To be truly what one is – a dynamic accentuating individuality.
Yet actualizing the delight of serene oneness in a shared economy.
There are no dogmas in Auroville or traditional religious rituals
No conventional practices to conform to or blindly follow.
The Journey within is uniquely individual and yet
Is integral to the collectiveness, uplifting all.
The amazing taxi drivers in Auroville
Always seem to find their paths and destinations effortlessly.
They manage this without wasting any precious resource
Be it time, fuel, or the goodwill of their passengers!
They seem to know every inch of the way
Instinctively, whether by day or night, at dawn or dusk.
The trees and shrubs along the roadside guide them on
And every rock and pebble beacons them to their chosen goals.
I salute these skilful taxi drivers who successfully
Navigate to their destinations without GIS and GPS.
We can all learn from these taxi drivers,
Learning from the surroundings and open to that which is within us.
The guidance of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother is always there ¬–
Requiring us only to open ourselves to them going beyond our little minds.
Humanity perpetually transits but progresses ever so slowly.
Now it may change faster as the World is becoming a global village.
May the world of tomorrow or the day after
Be a wondrous expanded reality of Auroville in its fully actualized potential.
May we transmute towards a fraternal global community –
To live in Harmony, Beauty, Bliss and Truth.
24 April 2010
Published in Sri Aurobindo’s Action, July 2010