PLATE ONE

After selecting a pleasing location on the riverbank, Lord Krsna and
His friends opened their baskets of food and began eating in great tran-
scendental pleasure. Like the whorl of a lotus flower surrounded by its
petals and leaves, Krsna sat in the center, encircled by lines of His
friends, who all looked very beautiful. Every one of them was trying to
look forward toward Krsna, thinking that Krsna might look toward him.
Among the cowherd boys, some placed their lunch on flowers, some on
leaves, fruits, or bunches of leaves, some actually in their baskets, some
on the bark of trees and some on rocks. This is what the children
imagined to be their plates as they ate their lunch. All the cowherd boys
enjoyed their lunch with Krsna, showing one another the different tastes
of the different varieties of preparations they had brought from home.
Tasting one another’s preparations, they began to laugh and make one
another laugh. In this way they all enjoyed their lunch in the forest.
(pp. 6-10)
