India is a poor country. To make arrangements to come to America, and then to be refused by the commune, is simply inhuman. These people had come by selling their houses, their lands, all their belongings – and they were not accepted.

But because I was in silence, I never came to know what was going on. She had sent away many Indian sannyasins in a very ugly way.

Now everybody can come, because nobody has raped me, nor have I raped anybody. I don’t have any antagonism for anybody in the whole world. In fact, it was because of Sheela that Oregon became so hostile to the commune. I was silent. For five years I did not read any newspapers, did not listen to the radio, did not read any books.

It is all finished. I am keeping my eyes open only for you, just to see you and let you see in my eyes is enough. Whatever I had to achieve, I have achieved. I have loved enormously. I have been loved by millions of men and women. There is not any experience which was worth having that I have not passed through.

If death comes in this moment I will be going rejoicing, because it is not taking anything away from me. My life has been a complete contentment and fulfillment.

If I am still breathing, I am breathing for you, because before I leave I would like you to be in the same space in which I have lived.

So now nobody will be thrown out of the commune, and anybody who knocks on our doors has to be accepted.

Now there is no need for Oregonians to be hostile to us. Our hands will be always waiting for their hands, and our hearts will be always waiting for their hearts.

Sheela created this ugly situation because her life has been misery, anger, hatred. She created an unnecessary hostility.

But now I am speaking again. That hostility will disappear just like a dewdrop on a lotus leaf disappears in the early morning sun.

We are Oregonians. Now it is for Oregonians to become red! Why should those poor people choose to be dead rather than be red? We will change the whole situation. The whole world is ours – Oregon included. They are simple human beings reacting in simple human ways. There was no need to create what Sheela did.

It is past history and we have to erase it.

Just the other day I came to know that Sheela, and the whole gang that has escaped from here, were trying to kill three people who are very close to me: Devaraj, my physician; Devageet, who was my dentist in India; and Vivek, who has taken care of me for all these fifteen years as lovingly as no other woman is capable of. Twenty-four hours a day she has been just like a shadow to me, thinking of such small things – about my dress, about my bath, about my food.