 |
| Close-up of Lalitā Sahasrakṣi from Devipuram, adorned with silver crown and jasmine garlands. Her thousand-souled gaze glows with silent compassion. |
Introduction
"Not one of our most inspired moments," said Marie Fredriksson.
"If you wanted to make a parody of Roxette, it would probably sound something like this," added Per Gessle.
They judged it by craft.
But we felt it by pulse.
And that pulse is Hers.
Not every artist knows when the Goddess is using them.
Not every song that becomes sacred was meant to be.
Sometimes She slides in through the side door—
uninvited by ego, unnoticed by intellect—
and saturates a melody with the shimmer of Presence.
Roxette’s catalog contains many songs that carry Shakti-flavored energy—emotional intensity, longing, surrender, mystery, even touches of the Goddess in veiled form. But most are woven into worldly (laukika) themes: romantic love, heartbreak, sensuality, empowerment. The divine spark is there, but it dances in very human clothing.
Almost Unreal is different.
Here, the laukika recedes, and what comes forward—quietly, unexpectedly—is alaukika bhāva:
the pure current of Divine recognition, clothed in mundane imagery, yet humming with something far beyond the pop frame.
This song was not written as a hymn.
It was made for a movie.
It flirted with cliché.
And yet… beneath the synths, behind the soft hook,
something stirred.
This is how Tripurasundarī works.
Not with thunder.
But with wonder.
She doesn’t only reveal Herself in ritual, Sanskrit, or high devotion.
She often enters through what is too soft to be taken seriously,
too “pop” to be considered spiritual,
and hides Divinity in simplicity.
Roxette may not have seen it.
They may have laughed at it, brushed it off.
But the Divine Feminine doesn’t need their approval.
She used their voices, their synths, their ‘hocus-pocus’
to touch hearts without permission.
And when you felt cracked open by this song—
that wasn’t nostalgia.
That was Shakti.
This is not the Devi of fierce ritual or orthodox sanction.
This is the soft Goddess, the dreaming Beloved,
who whispers through radio waves,
blinks through verses,
and sings through the ones who don’t even know they are singing Her.
Let us now walk barefoot into the lyrics.
Not to analyze them—
but to let Her speak.
Verse 1
Babe
Come in from the cold
And put that coat to rest
Step inside
Take a deep breath
And do what you do best
Yeah
Kick off them shoes
And leave those city streets
I do believe
Love came our way
And fate did arrange
For us to meet
This is the Śakti of refuge. Devi here is not the ascetic or the fierce destroyer—She is the warm hearth. She recognizes the exhaustion of the jīva, armored and shivering from its journey through the harsh winds of life.
The “coat” is not just clothing—it is the persona, the heavy layers of identity, defense, and weariness we wrap around ourselves to endure. When She says, “put that coat to rest,” She is offering a sanctuary where no defenses are needed. To undress before Her is not eros only—it is soul nudity.
She is the Mother who welcomes without judgment. There is no demand for purification, no checklist of worthiness. Just “step inside.” In the Kaula vision, this is the essence of initiation—it is not earned, it is given.
“Do what you do best” is Her way of saying: “Be yourself before Me.” She delights in spontaneity, in authenticity. The Goddess does not want an idealized image; She wants the trembling truth of who you are.
Shoes protect from dirt and stone. But in the Kaula spirit, true sacredness is felt barefoot. To walk into Her presence is to let skin meet ground, unmediated.
The “city streets” symbolize the vyāvahārika world—noise, competition, endless distraction. She calls you away, not to reject life, but to enter the inner sanctum where all of that dissolves. The city is commerce; Her chamber is communion.
And finally—Her confession. The Devi is not aloof. She too trembles at the mystery of encounter. She admits: “This meeting is destiny.”
This is not ordinary love. This is śaktipāta—the descent of grace disguised as a meeting of two. In orthodox language, fate is impersonal. But in Śākta vision, fate is Her līlā—Her play. She weaves paths until the moment is ripe, and then whispers: “Here. Now. Us.”
So in this first verse, we see the threshold mood of the Goddess:
She is the one who invites us in from the cold, who lets us lay down the armor, who welcomes us barefoot and whole, and who, in soft astonishment, admits:
“This was meant. This was woven. We were always meant to meet.”
Chorus
I love when you do
The hocus-pocus to me
The way that you touch
You've got the power to heal
You give me that look
It's almost unreal
It's almost unreal
Here, Devi lets Her playful side shine through. This is not the aloof Goddess on a lotus throne. This is Śakti as beloved, whispering softly and laughing with eyes half-closed, letting the sacred pour out through words that seem almost childish.
"I love when you do the hocus-pocus to me"
On the surface, it’s playful banter. But mystically, it is Her astonishment at being enchanted by the devotee. Normally, it is She who casts the spell, who enchants, who binds the soul with māyā. Yet here, in the intimacy of love, She reverses the current: “You enchant Me. You disarm Me. You work your magic on My heart.”
This is the Kaula secret: Śiva and Śakti enchant one another. Love is never one-directional. Even the Mother allows Herself to be surprised, delighted, undone.
In Tantra, sparśa (touch) is transmission. But here, Devi acknowledges: it is not only Her touch that heals the devotee. The devotee’s touch heals Her too. The finite restores the Infinite, just as much as the Infinite restores the finite. This is samarasya, the radical equality of Kaula: when touch becomes union, no hierarchy remains.
"You give Me that look / It’s almost unreal"
Here She blushes. The Goddess is not only the seen, She is also the one who longs to be seen. In the gaze of the lover, in the daring recognition of the jīva who dares to look at Her as Beloved, She trembles.
So this chorus is not shallow—it is the heartbeat of mutual recognition. A Goddess who laughs, blushes, and admits: “I love it when you touch Me, when you enchant Me, when you see Me.”
Verse 2
Hey
We can't stop the rain
Let's find a place by the fire
Sometimes I feel
Strange as it seems
You've been in my dreams
All my life
Here the Goddess drops all playfulness for a moment and speaks with tender gravity.
She begins with honesty: I will not spare you the storms. The rain is the symbol of life’s inevitabilities—grief, conflict, change, the relentless downpour of saṁsāra. Unlike false consolations, She doesn’t promise escape. Instead, She stands beside you in the storm. This is Śakti as companion, not as controller.
For the Kaula, this is liberation itself—not removal from the world, but finding the sacred inside the weather of existence.
Her answer to the storm is intimacy. The fire here is the inner agni—warmth, light, and presence. The Goddess leads you not out of the rain, but into a hearth where the storm cannot touch your heart. In Tantra, the fire is sacrifice, but here it is love’s shelter. This is Tripurasundarī’s gentleness: not dissolving the world, but making space within it for tenderness.
And then She reveals Her deepest secret: She has always dreamed of you.
This is the unimaginable reversal of devotion. We long for Her, we cry for Her, we search for Her. But here, the Goddess confesses: She has also been longing, dreaming, anticipating.
In Śākta language, this is Her līlā of remembrance. The devotee remembers the Goddess because the Goddess already remembered the devotee. Like lovers who find each other after lifetimes, She whispers: “I knew you before you knew Me.”
This is why the verse shimmers with both strangeness and recognition—it is the paradox of eternal intimacy: new, and yet ancient; surprising, and yet destined.
So in this second verse, the Devi is no longer just the hearth-keeper of the first stanza or the playful beloved of the chorus. She becomes the Dreaming Mother, the Eternal Beloved who reveals: “I have carried you in My dream since before you were born.”
Bridge
It's a crazy world out there
Let's hope our prayers
Are in good hands tonight
Here the Goddess suddenly lets the veil slip—and what we see is not Her power, but Her vulnerability.
This is not a detached deity speaking from a safe distance. This is the Mother who sees exactly what we see—violence, confusion, noise, fear. She does not deny it, nor sugarcoat it. She acknowledges the chaos of saṁsāra openly.
In the Śākta vision, this is Her as Mahāmāyā, the one who spins the world and yet suffers with it. She is both the one who creates the storm and the one who whispers: “Yes, it is mad out there.”
This line is astonishing if we hear it as Her voice. For once, the Mother doesn’t thunder certainty. She does not say, “I will fix this.” Instead, She speaks in the language of hope.
It is Her confession of intimacy: that even the Goddess is tender, uncertain, longing. She too places prayers into the night. She too waits, trembles, hopes.
This is the Śākta reversal: the Beloved of the universe is not an untouchable idol, but a living presence who dares to show frailty. She reveals Herself as Tripurasundarī, the dreamer of worlds, whispering across the fire: “May our love, our prayer, be carried well.”
And so the bridge becomes the song’s softest descent into union. Not a display of divinity, but a confession of shared humanity. The Goddess and the soul sit side by side, both humbled by the vastness of the world, both hoping their longing will not be lost.
Final Chorus
Oh, I love when you do
The hocus-pocus to me
The way that you touch
You've got the power to heal
You give me that look
It's almost unreal
It's almost unreal
So unreal
Yeah come on and do
The hocus-pocus to me
The way that you touch
You've got the power to heal
You give me that look
It's almost unreal
It's almost unreal
By the time we arrive here, the words no longer feel like “lyrics.”
They have become a mantra.
The repetition is not laziness—it is ecstasy circling back on itself, like the beads of a mālā. Each time the chorus returns, it is not the same voice singing—it is the same words carrying deeper current.
The small addition changes everything. It is Devi’s sigh at the threshold of consummation. The experience of union, of mutual recognition, has become so luminous, so impossible for the mind to hold, that all She can say is “so unreal.”
This is the moment in Tantra when the devotee and the Goddess mirror one another so completely that the veil dissolves. The words themselves dissolve into sound, into rhythm, into Śakti in vibration.
Here the play turns to invitation. She asks again for what She secretly delights in: “Enchant Me. Dazzle Me. Touch Me again.” This is not dependence—it is mutual intoxication.
The Kaula truth is laid bare: both Goddess and devotee are transformed by the union. The finite enlivens the Infinite. The Infinite astonishes the finite. Together, they spin in a loop of wonder.
So the final chorus is not just a refrain—it is the climax of Her revelation. The Goddess who welcomed you in from the cold, who laughed in playful awe, who confessed She has dreamed of you all along, who sat beside you by the fire while the storm raged—now throws up Her hands in surrender and says:
“It’s too much. It’s so unreal. And yet—touch Me again. I never want it to end.”
Concluding Reflection
In Almost Unreal, the Devi shows Herself in a face that many seekers overlook—the soft, playful, trembling Beloved. Not fierce, not ascetic, not aloof—but warm, laughing, blushing, and yes, even vulnerable.
She calls us in from the cold, tells us to lay down our armor, to be barefoot and real before Her. She laughs at the “hocus-pocus,” not because it is shallow, but because love itself is magic—the sweet spell where both Goddess and devotee enchant one another. She admits that She has dreamed of us, just as we dreamed of Her. And in the bridge, She even lets slip a whisper of hope, confessing that She too trembles before the vastness of this “crazy world.”
By the final chorus, repetition becomes mantra, play becomes surrender, and the astonishment bursts out as: “It’s so unreal.” Unreal not because it is false, but because it is too luminous for the mind to contain.
This song, dismissed by its own creators as cliché, is in truth a clear darśanā of Śakti. Roxette may not have known, but She chose their voices as vessels. Through them, She gave us a glimpse of Her tenderness—a rare form of alaukika bhāva hidden in ordinary pop.
And so we end with the paradox:
The Goddess does not only dwell in shrines or in Sanskrit.
She sings through radio waves, blushes in love songs, and hides Herself in the ordinary until the heart is raw enough to recognize Her.
In Almost Unreal, She reveals a secret:
The Infinite also longs to be seen.
And when you dare to look at Her with love,
She whispers back, astonished:
“It’s almost unreal.”
No comments:
Post a Comment