“Bells”

He picked up two brass bells in his left hand and began ringing them.  Then, lighting two sticks of incense from the candle near the picture of Lord Caitanya and His associates, he began waving the incense slowly in small circles before Lord Caitanya, while still ringing the bells.  He looked deeply at the picture and continued cutting spirals of fragrant smoke, all the while ringing the bells.  None of the boys knew what he was doing, although he did it every evening.  But it was a ceremony.  It meant something.  The boys began to call the ceremony “bells.” 

After bells, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, it would usually be time for the evening kirtana.  Some of the boys would already be downstairs greeting guests and explaining about the Swami and the chanting.  But without the Swami, nothing could begin.  No one knew how to sing or drum, and no one dared think of leading the mantra-chanting without him.  Only when he entered at seven o’clock could they begin.

Freshly showered and dressed in his clean hand-woven cloth, his arms and body decorated with arrowlike Vaisnava markings, Prabhupada would leave his apartment and go downstairs to face another ecstatic opportunity to glorify Krishna.  The tiny temple would be crowded with wild, unbrahminical, candid young Americans.