Perceiving you, O enchanter, is both enriching and impoverishing

gṛhāṇeṣa mām ajñam edhy akṣi-dṛśyaḥ

Receive me, Lord, though lost in night,
And grant my eyes your saving sight.
Though foolish, still to you I run,
Let me see you, O radiant one.

(Damodarashtakam — Verse 6, Line 4)

My dear Lord, you are ever present everywhere, but I can’t see you anywhere because my eyes are blind. Yet even when I am blind to you and your glory, you are never blind to me—nor to my misery.
You tirelessly extend your mercy toward me, offering me opportunities to remember you.
And when I cherish and cultivate your rememberance, I begin to sense your presence.

O enchanting Lord, your all-attractiveness is so extraordinary
that even the faintest perception of you evokes two opposite effects—
it both enriches and impoverishes me.
It enriches me because even a slight contact with you—through remembrance alone—
fills my heart with a joy so deep that all the world’s pleasure feels unnecessary, even unappealing.
Yet it also impoverishes me,
for each experience of you kindles within my heart a deeper longing—
a flame to know you more, to experience you more intimately.
That is why I long to behold you with my eyes,
though I know, O Lord, that I am far from qualified for such a vision.

O supremely wise Lord,
may these twin longings—to hold your remembrance internally
and to behold your presence externally—
purify my heart completely, directing it toward you fully and irrevocably.
And whenever you so desire, please, O Lord, grant me your darshan:
the vision that fulfills all visions.