Divinity lives as soul in all creation, evolving upwardly from the ocean sand to gemstones and precious metals then to plants, animals, and finally in humankind. This hierarchy of evolution is celebrated in Paramahansa Yogananda’s “My Kinsmen” from Songs of the Soul. The advanced soul is capable of remembering all of its prior incarnations from gemstones to humanity, and that memory expresses itself in the love that the advanced yogi feels universally for all.
Stanza 1: “In spacious hall of trance”
The speaker metaphorically paints the scene of a grand banquet attended by all of his relatives and friends from his past lives. The advanced yogi literally experiences this gathering “in spacious hall of trance,” that is, in deep meditation.
Stanza 2: “The banquet great with music swelled”
The speaker avers that the great sound of “Aum” fills the banquet hall, as music would be a traditional part of any celebration. He observes that all of the guests are colorfully dressed, “in many ways arrayed, / Some plain, some gorgeous dress displayed.”
Stanza 3: “Around the various tables large”
The speaker reports that the “various tables large” are, in fact, the “earth and moon and sun and stars.” By placing the banquet hall in space, the speaker suggests the ineffable nature of his experience. Those planets are, of course, merely metaphorical representations of the experience in high consciousness that the speaker is undergoing.
Stanza 4: “The tiny-eye and shiny sands”
In the fourth stanza, the speaker begins to report the physical appearance of some of the “guests” along with his memory from the time when he lived among them. He begins with his experience as sand along the ocean, when he “drank of ocean’s life.” He remembers that incarnation, in which he “brawled / For a sip of sea, with kinsmen sands.”
Stanza 5: “Yes, I know those old dame rocks”
He then recalls his incarnation as “a tiny baby tree,” a frustrating time for him because he wanted so much to be able to “run with winds so free.” The guests who remind him of this incarnation are “those old dame rocks / Who held me on their stony laps.” He is recalling his former mothers.
Stanza 6: “The green-attirèd friends I know”
The speaker then observes the “rose and lily buds aglow” and is reminded that he once “adorned a kingly breast — / Lost life; returned to mother dust.” As a flower, he once decorated the costume of a king, before losing that life, and having that vegetable-body return to the dust of the earth.
Stanza 7: “I know the ruby’s red breast dear”
The speaker reports his memory from the time that he “smiled in diamonds, gleaming bright.” He also remembers that his “blood in [the ruby’s red breast] once flowed so clear.” Again he shows that the advanced spiritual seeker is able to remember his past incarnations from every stage of his evolution.
Stanza 8: “A ray of friendship from my heart”
The souls of diamonds and rubies, in this yogi’s exalted state of awareness, remember with smiles and tears when they “meet their long-lost friend at last.”
Stanza 9: “The soul of gold in yellow gown”
The speaker encounters souls he once knew when they are gold and silver; and they are dressed respectively in “yellow gown” and “white robe.” As they smile on him “maternal smiles,” the speaker avers that these souls were also former mothers.
Stanza 10: “The leafy fingers, arms outspread”
The speaker then encounters another former mother that nurtured him when he was “a tiny bird.” With “leafy fingers, arms outspread,” his tree home/mother “caressed him” and “fed [him] with ambrosial fruit.”
Stanza 11: “The lark, the cuckoo, the pleasant sweet”
In the eleventh stanza, the speaker offers a catalogue of creatures: lark, cuckoo, pheasant, deer, lamb, lion, shark, and other “monsters of the sea”—all greeted him “in love and peace.”
Stanza 12: “When first the atoms and stardust sprang”
To capstone his encounter, the speaker avers that he has existed throughout eternity, from the beginning of creation, “when first the atoms and stardust sprang” from the mind of God. When each spiritual tradition came into being, he partook of each: “When Vedas, Bible, Koran sang, / I joined each choir.” And now the chants, hymns, and songs of those faiths, “still echo in [his] soul in accents strong.”
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