Prabhanjan Kumar
The air vibrates with rhythmic music
and a touch of the sacred,
mind lapses into a soporific trance
when the Damru* dances
a jig, and the billowing smoke
captures the spirit of hemp rolls.
Our lord of annihilation, who
is an epitome of humility, living
the life
of a maveric pauper; animals,
ghouls and the dead souls for
company;
compassionate to the level of
being
trampled over by Kali, his wife.
Third of the Triumvirate of the
Hindu Pantheon, an Aryan god,
but secular to
finger tips, bestowing boons of
immortality
even on heretics and Asuras,
taking pity
if they grovel enough at his feet,
often blamed for his misplaced piety.
A lover of hemp and poppy!
also could
grieve for wife’s death, roaming
the earth
with her rotting body on
shoulders; parts falling off;
propounding the belief that
anger can be the other name of
love, a terrifying Tandav.
I don’t know, why the maveric
lord
doesn’t revolt to be worshipped
as an erect phallus, perched
perennially
in a yoni; as if the
lord has on other missions than
being fixated
to the project of procreation.
Besides being the most ancient
ascetic, he should hold the
Guinness record as
the world’s first Aghori*; he
camps in cremation yards,
smeared with the soot from
pyres, wearing live snakes and
tiger skin,
hair held in a tangled and knotted mass.
What can I offer to such a cute
and quaint earthy lord, who
presides over creation and annihilation?
Except a shred of wayward thought?
A line of lost words
like Egyptian hieroglyphs?
My untamed spirits?
* Aghori means one having a liking for the dead and decay, they are not horrified by corpses, necropolis or necromancers.
