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| Chairman Bhau Kalchuri |
In 1997, my training began with healer and reader David Cousins from Wales, who would be my first spiritual teacher connecting me with Meher Baba. David was exposing me to myself in a flow of new and copious information received through personal readings and workshops during a three-year period, with two more interchanges by the seventh year. One of his revelations was that the angel of death would be working with me. He conveyed his knowledge rapidly, interrupting his topics with little chuckles, as his eyes alternately twinkled or offered me a serious gaze. I, curious, amazed, and with subdued delight, listened to what was unusual, and questioned but once.
However, it was to be years after my final, brief visit with David that I saw the angel of death for the first time. What would become my repeated visits by this angel began at an unremembered date and were solely connected to the changing strength and health of Bhau Kalchuri, one of Meher Baba’s last living mandali and the chairman of the Meher Baba trust.* In reflection now, I realize that for whatever reason, she (the angel’s face was a feminine one) was giving me information solely about Bhau’s health and about no one else. Each time, I shared what I had heard with the same two people involved with his care, who confirmed that my information matched his condition; I did not inquire about its nature as my intent was only that I was to offer what I was receiving. The purpose beyond that was not made clear to me. It may simply have been training that I needed to experience.
Bhau Kalchuri drew Meher Baba’s lovers to him with open lovingness and a dry sense of humor, whether they were present at Meherabad or in locations around the world. His Trust bulletins and his Sunday chat, broadcast globally, brought him to the attention of many. Therefore, as he aged, as his health altered from strong to weak more frequently with different physical challenges, the question of whether he might be close to passing, or was passing, was frequently in the thoughts and hearts of many.
My angel of death (I imagine there are many individuated for differing receivers) was black lace, shaped as a feminine head with wings on either side; nothing more. I would see her in a tree at a distance from Bhau and know that she was present but without activity. Other times I would see her behind him and by embracing his head would be pulling him toward her. But his knees would be bent, holding onto something that kept him from leaving; at times it would be only by his heels that he resisted her desire to take him. This vision returned many times, but each time she would not succeed in her efforts.
I contacted David Cousins, whom I hadn’t spoken with in years, regarding what I was seeing. With his usual quick and accurate assessment of the situation, he explained that by repeatedly moving closer then farther away from the time when his life would end, Bhau was offering practice for Baba’s lovers and followers who depended on him for maintaining their connection with Baba. One day they would have to face the absence of his gentle glances, personal, loving greetings, and his hand on theirs, giving Baba’s prasad.* By his congenial manner with those clinging to his words, his looks at each one that he spoke to, the lovely colors of his clothing for his Sunday chats, whether he was strong or weak Bhau truly responded to those who needed him for years, allowing the many who loved him to gradually process their feelings. When the time came, their grieving, though deeply felt, would be steadied and balanced by gratitude for all that he had given.
The visits from the angel of death and my reports to Bhau’s caregivers went on as they had, until the time came when I no longer saw her.
Then one day when I went to close a living room window, I paused, for there was a small, black bird perched on the ledge, unmoving. Not wanting to startle the bird, I waited. And waited. I was clearly in the bird’s vision and no more than a foot from it, but my presence had no effect on it. We both waited a long time. Finally I asked the bird if it had to do with a death and received an affirmative response. I asked if it was for this mandali and received another affirmation. I do not remember if I finally walked away or if once I had understood its purpose, the bird could and did leave. My training over the years has been to receive information knowing that I am not the origin, and so I let what I hear remain until something more happens. Six months later, Bhau did finally make his passage home to Meher Baba. It has been several years since then with neither of those winged harbingers reappearing.
My realization is, “Any one of us may find an unusual experience occurring that is outside any request, with no explanation as to why we have been chosen for it. Yet to allow a vast universe to open itself by our receiving the unfathomable is to enter into its mystery by less than one millionth of one millionth of a hair’s breadth.”
* Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual, Public, Charitable Trust, Ahmednagar, India. www.ambppct.org.
* A gift of love from the Master to a seeker, usually edible but not necessarily so. Arnavaz N. Dadachangi, Gift of God (Trenton, NJ: Beloved Archives, 2005).