nama oṁ viṣṇu-pādāya kṛṣṇa-preṣṭhāya bhū-tale
śrīmate jayapatākā-svāmin iti nāmine
nama ācārya-pādāya nitāi-kṛpā-pradāyine
gaura-kathā-dhāma-dāya nagara-grāma-tāriṇe
My Dear and Merciful Spiritual Master, Śrīla Jayapatākā Swāmī,
Please accept my most respectful obeisances at your lotus feet!
On this very auspicious day, I would like to thank you again and again for giving me shelter and for setting such an extraordinary example of surrender, perseverance, tolerance, compassion, faith, enthusiasm, strength—and so much more.
You are full of genuine love for every living entity. You always place the welfare of others before your own. You make us feel comfortable, loved, nurtured, and linked together as a spiritual family—a wonderful, nourishing spiritual family. Even from afar, we feel you extremely close.
I sincerely pray not to waste this one-lifetime opportunity to have your shelter and to serve you for the rest of my life. I pray that I may be able to satisfy you.
“I am by nature the eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa. But because of my bad fortune, I have been inimical toward Him from time immemorial, and thus I have identified myself with my body and continuously wandered in the cycle of birth and death in the material world, suffering the burning threefold miseries. Now, as a result of some unimaginable good fortune, my spiritual master’s mercy has enabled me to know that I am Kṛṣṇa’s eternal servant, an infinitesimal spiritual being completely apart from the gross and subtle body. And so, by the order of my spiritual master, I have obtained the good fortune of serving his lotus feet and, following in his footsteps, the lotus feet of Śrī Śrī Gaura-Nitāi, Śrī Śrī Jagannātha, Baladeva, Śrīmatī Subhadrā, and Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Vrajasundara.”
Your grateful daughter,
Devakī Rūpā devī dāsī