|| śrī līlāśukaviracita śrī kṛṣṇakarṇāmṛtam ||
karāravindena padāravindaṃ
mukhāravinde viniveśayantam |
vaṭasya patrasya puṭe śayānam
bālaṃ mukundaṃ manasā smarāmi ||2-57 ||
Re-ordered word-by-word meaning
smarāmi manasā - I remember with all my mind(=heart!)
mukundaṃ Mukunda=Narayana=Krishna, who gives liberation, as
bālaṃ - that baby who
karāravindena - with his lotus-like hands,
padāravindaṃ - (taking up) his lotus-like foot,
viniveśayantam - was placing it
mukhāravinde - in his mouth, which was lotus-like,
śayānam - while resting on
vaṭasya patrasya puṭe - the Peepal/Ashwattha leaf surface.
This imagery is beautifully depicted in the Srimad Bhagavatam and narrated in this famous shloka by Sri Lilashuka. The Lord Narayana=Krishna, as a baby, is envisioned as lying only on an Ashwattha leaf, sucking his toe. It is after the great deluge, when everything in creation disappears. Now the entire universe is in its latent form, resting in Narayana's stomach. He is about to send forth the creation anew.
We need to understand our mythology as a grand conception of the cycle of creation, and its dynamic interaction with the Creator, in a way we can see everyday in our lives. Anybody who has tended an infant in the cradle would be able to relate to this imagery.
