Vijñapti — Appeals

Vijnapti, petition, closes Kalyana-Kalpataru's third division, Ucchvasa, with four songs of direct appeal addressed to Krishna under the name Gopinatha, Lord of the cowherds — a warmer, more pastoral register than the philosophical opening of Sambandha-abhidheya-prayojana earlier in the same book. Rather than developing argument or extended description, these songs simply ask plainly: to be heard, for material existence to be removed, for Gopinatha to be recognized as the only real means of deliverance available. The section's opening song, with by far the most recordings gathered anywhere across this whole Kalyana-Kalpataru project, appears to remain among the most widely sung of all Bhaktivinoda Thakura's compositions generally, not confined to this one book. The section, and Kalyana-Kalpataru as a whole, closes on the mind turned toward the joint lotus feet of Radha and Krishna together — an image Bhaktivinoda would return to across several of his later songbooks, though its use here marks one of its earliest appearances in his published work.