Krishna and the Cowgirls
The great and fetid land of India has oft been my home. Though my quest for solubility and my overarching destiny to disciple the multitudes to this arcane yet gelastic truth has led me from one end of this gently spinning sphere to another, India yet ever beckons me, like a winsome and ragged waif, covered in open sores, selling fresh kulcha on the festive and corpse-lined streets of Calcutta. During the Years of Much Fish, when I was alone with naught but my cetacean companions, I dreamt of returning to the dark and mystical subcontinent, Mother of Pestilence and Sacred Misery. Many hours I spent relating the wonderful tales and dramas of that most ancient of religions, Hinduism, The Great Perpetuator of Divine Agony, to my eager dolphin audience. How they thrilled to my stirring narratives detailing the glorious lives of Vamana and Kurma and Kalki. They especially admired (and to a certain extent) envied the Vamana Avatar: his spectacular and wily third leg filled them all with squealing awe. But their excitement knew no confines when I would relate the deeds and life of their eternal favorite, Lord Krishna. Though they would never admit as much, I long suspected they were overly fond of him principally due to his having much the same skin coloration as themselves, blue-grey.
   Orphine, the chief of the dolphins that rescued and sustained me never tired of these hebetudinous and sultry tales. One afternoon, while I was clamming and meditating on the edge of the lagoon, he arrived with his entire olid harem. Settling in the shallow water, he looked at me sidelong and yet before he spoke, my intuition prepared me for his familiar request, "Akiryon, tell us please, if you will be so kind, of Lord Krishna of the beautiful skin."
   "I would be honored and delighted, Orphine," I replied. "I shall tell you the story of Krishna and what is more, the little-known truth as to how his skin attained this remarkable hue."

   "Once upon a time there dwelt an evil and feculent king named Kamsa in Mathura. He burdened his own kingdom with his many lewd excesses, mandatory frog-eating contests, scatological puppet shows and all-night twister parties. One Tuesday, a voice from heaven roared, 'Kamsa! Your end is nigh! The eighth son of Devaki, your sister, shall be the one who brings about your death.' Kamsa was enraged beyond words, and being without a thesaurus, he imprisoned Devaki as well as Vasudeva her libidinous husband. He then slayed every child of the couple upon birth. But at midnight when the eighth child was born, the skies again roared and Lord Vishnu, assuming the guise of a gigantic, many-armed pig-rat-snake-cow-monkey, advised the nerve-wracked Vasudeva to take the child across the river Yamuna to the other side to the village of Gokul and trade him for the daughter of Yashoda in Gokul, who was (conveniently) born on the very same day. Vasudeva accordingly put the child in a basket (don't they all), and as he left, the doors of the prison magically opened for him. The river also parted of its own allowing Vasudeva to cross unhindered, though muddied to the loins. After exchanging the newborns, he returned silently to his prison and his terminally exhausted wife. The cries of the changeling, however, awakened Kamsa, and delighted to kill yet another of the productive couple's children, snatched up the infant girl. But as he lifted her high in the air, his scimitar in hand, the baby, who was in actuality a sort of hideously sickening incarnation of the hideously sickening Devi herself, laughed in bilious glee and chortled, 'Kamsa, your real enemy is still alive. The son of Devaki is alive and well and will come back to kill you. Ah, ha ha ha ha!' and then vanished like a curried fart upon the wind. Kamsa, white with rage, therefore killed all the male infants in his kingdom. There was, alas, an overabundance of unsold blue blankets in the marketplace but..."
   "Pardon, Akiryon, but what has this to do with the Lord Krishna's majestic skin tone?" queried Orphine.
   "I'm coming to that, my impatient and aquatic friend. Anyway, Krishna led a very pampered life in the Gokul. There being no males left, he was quite popular with all the thousands of gopikaas, the cowgirls, who dwelt there tending their herds. Ever they would gaze lustily through the flowering jasmine at the young man, pulling firmly on the teats of their lowing cows, drooling as they watched his every move. They especially enjoyed watching him "play his flute" as they called it, for it was always in his hand and he seemed never to tire of playing with it.
   "But as Krishna grew to young manhood, he yearned for new activities. Having grown weary of playing his flute, and being quite mischievous and froward, he discovered that there was great enjoyment to be found in breaking the gopikaas butter pots. This greatly delighted the cowgirls who stood in line for days awaiting a turn to have their butter pots broken. Eventually, he gave up flute playing altogether and concentrated his youthful energies solely on providing this service for the thousands of lonely cowgirls. His popularity grew considerably. This continued for years, until one day he met Radha. 'Okay, you're next,' the lad replied, loosening his robe. But he was shocked when Radha did not assume the position known as The Churning of the Cream, but stated, 'I have not come to have my butter pot broken, but to learn to play the flute.'
   "Amazed, Krishna aquiesced. Pulling out his flute he invited the young cowgirl to hold it. Gently she ran her fingers up and down its length. 'But this produces no sound,' she whined. 'Ah, fair maiden, a flute must be blown to make lovely music,' Krishna answered. 'You must put the end in your mouth.'
   "But Krishna did not know Radha, her strength, or her total lack of understanding in these matters. Long years of milking had given her fingers like tempered steel talons and her lungs were like the twin bellows in smith's forge. Putting Krishna's flute in her mouth, she began to blow with all her might. The startled young man struggled to escape, but her fingers held him as in a vice. Still she blew, her face growing a dusky red, the veins protruding from her throbbing temples. The young man felt as if he would burst, but still she blew like a monsoon. Slowly, beginning at his captive flute, his skin began to assume a dusky hue. When he regained consciousness, he found that his entire body was the color of a new-lain robin's egg. Grabbing the now much-winded cowgirl by the throat, he leapt upon her, immediately breaking her butter pot. His hand on her throat stifled her cries and before long, the same blue tint that had covered Krishna began to creep over her violated flesh.
   "Krishna never did regain his normal coloration, but remained blue-skinned forever. Fortunately for him this did nothing to lessen his appeal to the lonely cowgirls, the gopikaas, who were as desperate as ever. The boldly passionate Radha's skin, in the course of time, and with the vigorous aid of diverse herbal remedies and potions, returned to its normal tone; but nevertheless she learned a valuable lesson that day that she was never to forget. Forthwith it became an adage and a caution among the gopikaas: Even cowgirls get the blues."

Dolphins, reincarnation, New Age, philosophy, humor, poetry, teaching, ascended masters, fish, Baba, crystals, spirituality, karma, India, idiots, Akiryon Baba Yat, The Dolphin Sky Foundation, zen, transcendental meditation, past lives, fish, satire, religion, religious satire, sufism, cetaceans, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Eastern religions