माता भूमिः पुत्रो अहं पृथिव्याः

Idly, the other day, I asked Grok for a poem on nature. Whether dear Mary Oliver is the go-to on such subjects or if the omniscient Internet trackers know of my love for her, I don’t know. However, it offered to me this painfully beautiful poem:

Sleeping In The Forest

I thought the earth remembered me, she
took me back so tenderly, arranging
her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds. I slept
as never before, a stone
on the riverbed, nothing
between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated
light as moths among the branches
of the perfect trees. All night
I heard the small kingdoms breathing
around me, the insects, and the birds
who do their work in the darkness. All night
I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling
with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.

***

So vivid, I could feel around me also dark, rich soil. Slightly moist under my fingers and more than a little alive. My ear pressed against quiet rustles in the earth.

I asked Grok immediately to give me an image depicting this beautiful scene. The results were nice but a bit limited.
 

 

I hopped across to Dall-e, my old favourite, with the same request and the response was a bit more fantastical and pleasing to me. 

The first image had exquisite balance but issues with rendering the human face. 

A tweak of the prompt yielded this.

What do you think?

TN Tour 8: Kanchipuram Extra

Isn’t it so amazing that for a temple town with over a thousand temples, there is only one to a feminine deity? Just the one for the lady Kamakshi, who reigns over the kshetra.

On our ‘extra day’ at Kanchipuram, there was a long list of things to do. The Lord Varadaraja Perumal was first order of business. 

This is a stunning temple complex with some highly intricate sculpture. 

A busload of tourists had arrived and that lengthened the queue time, during which I was able to admire the peeling but still wonderful paintings that covered the walls. 

We went to see the gold and silver lizards, where there was quite a bit of silly shoving not to mention yelling by the guards. I admit I felt a pang of worry with COVID so recently past, to touch them but it didn’t feel right to not do the done thing, either. 

In the main sanctum, the Lord himself was utterly magnificent. The temple has a long history (apparently has around 350 inscriptions from various dynasties) and is one of the 108 divya desams of Vishnu.

Next we asked Raj, our driver, to find us a way to the river. He consulted a local or two, followed a track with some dust raised on it and delivered us, quite without volition, at the Shri Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam. Now this is hallowed ground – the Peetam or Seat was established by Adi Shankara and has an unbroken lineage of 70 acharyas. We must’ve heard that phrase any number of times in our lives. However, somehow, it was not on our ‘Plan A’ checklist. But here we were, and since we were there, we went in. Only to stumble upon grand jayanti celebrations marking the birthday of the Jagadguru Bala Periyava that were underway with all the luminaries of the Peetam on stage. A little abashed, we occupied seats and sat for a while before crouching out in what we hoped was an unobtrusive manner.

We visited the brown riverbed that passes for River Vegavati, once again dismayed at the state of southern rivers. 

+++

That evening we made our way to the Kailashanathar koil. Words fail me as I try to describe the beauty of this wonderful Pallava-era structure. Built with sandstone, this is a square layout of exceptional beauty and balance. 

The lingam is a large and faceted one; I think they said 16, but I cannot be sure. We met an irascible, venerable old man here, one of the priests of the shrine. We fell to talking and he shared a little of what it was like to continue in work that was under appreciated today, brought in far too little… but we could see that he could not imagine his life in any other way but in the service of Shiva.

Around the main shrine, built cunningly into the structure, is a narrow circumambulatory passage. You are required to crouch into the tunnel which encircles the linga, and emerge onto Shiva’s left, a pradakshina that is said to give moksha to those who complete it. A young man before us attempted to clamber up with his backpack still strapped on. “Idé eDu!” our elderly priest chided him. “Remove this! Put it down here! No one is interested in your bag.” It was symbolic. You must drop your baggage if you set off on the path to mukti. 

It reminds me of Kabir:

कबीर का घर सिखर पर जहाँ सिलहली गेल
पाऊँ का टिके पिपील का तहाँ खलकन लादे बैल

On the very peak is Kabir’s home, and every step is treacherous
Even the ant finds the path slippery, how then to take a bullock-cart up?

We sat a while in the dusk, looking at the lovely lines of the temple. It is maintained by the Archaeological Survey of India, with the typical landscaping they deem appropriate for every single site under their domain – lawns dotted with the occasional shrub. But they permit prayers in here, while preserving the structure, so I will not carp too much about that.

We then visited the dargah of Hazrat Syed Shah Hameed Auliya of the Qadri, Chishti order, where we sat awhile. 

Then wandered over to Vaikunda Perumal koil, an atmospheric and very charming temple.

Alas, although it was down the street from our hotel, we could not visit the Chitragupar koil. Said to be an assistant of Yama’s, this gent is responsible for the accounts of our destiny, entries of our good and bad deeds. It is a rare temple and I should have liked to have seen it: Chitragupta, by logic, is a good deity to have in your corner. It was not to be. In any case, it would have been academic. I have turned over all my accounts books to someone else. He will fudge them for me.

Devis and other things

A new installment of the Tamil Nadu saga was ready but alas, my laptop (newish, just out of warranty period) is showing signs of distress by way of a damaged hinge. I could not take it with me to ashram when I was there for Mahashivratri and since my return to Hyderabad, I've been ill with one thing or the other. 

Since then, Sadhguru has consecrated the Devi Linga Bhairavi in Nepal, and she appears to be a magnificent entity, housed in a most exquisite temple. I am most excited about what her presence will do for that region.

Over the Navratri in 2022, a most wonderful thing happened. I was in Bodoland for most of Dussehra and on Saptami, I found myself in Guwahati, the land of the Goddess Kamakhya. It was a particularly crowded day but I was simply fortunate to be there. After almost 9 hours of waiting in queue, I was able to offer my homage to the lady. Now with Devi Linga Bhairavi (in a slightly altered variation) joining forces in the northeast of the subcontinent... it will be interesting. Nepal is lucky indeed.

***

Are the various overlays not interesting? From seeing this land as a political entity, with its rise and fall of kingdoms, I had moved to being interested in its physical nature – the lush fertile plains of the Ganga, the mountain ranges, the rivers that crisscross our Hindustan. Now it appears that the more subtle map of our spiritual hotspots is the thing to follow. 

Where are the radiating hubs? Why are they there? How do they tie together? How do they work together? Is it a boundary, or a network? Where are the holy men and women? How are they dotting the geography? Which shrines are still strong? Which took the brunt of invasions and lost their power and relevance? What idols are lying in wait, hidden in streams, farmers' fields, under rubble... just biding their time to emerge? Wouldn't it be wonderful to able to see these subtle connections? Till my perception sharpens, a lively imagination and conjecture will have to do.

TN Tour 4: On the road to Tiruvannamalai

Our route to Tiruvannamalai, the first night-halt, was punctuated by stops: Nerur, the samadhi sthala of the great saint Sadasiva Brahmendra; and Salem, where lies the jeeva samadhi of Mayamma, the wonderful avadhuta of Kanyakumari. Both places were magnificent.

Sadasiva Brahmendra finds a place among the six panels leading up to the Dhyanalinga at Isha. We have often heard and read stories of his life, his complete dis-identification with his body, we have heard his songs, typical in their laconic phrasing. His resting place I found restful, more silent than energetic. 

Mayamma’s samadhi – a smallish shrine off the Law College Road in Salem – was a place of loving sweetness with an undercurrent of buzz. Fittingly there were dogs here, Mayamma’s most beloved constant companions.  

***

One motif running through the entire trip was the rivers, in particular Cauvery whom we encountered time and again, crossing her course several times. Again, a special interest for us. Cauvery Calling, the massive on-ground movement to revive the river is supporting farmers to make a partial shift to agro-forestry. The mission is to plant 242 crore trees in the river basin, revitalizing the soil, and in turn, the river, which has been seeing dangerously depleted levels. We saw first-hand the truly heartbreaking state of the river and the smaller rivers that drain into it.

Near Karur, we went to the fascinating Agatheeswarar Temple on the banks of River Amaravathi, near the confluence of the rivers Kaveri, Amaravathi and the now-dead Thirumanimuthaar. The location was magnificent, the sunlight was brassy gold, birds chirped and flitted, not with the frenzy of dawn but with all the languor of the midday warmth. We’d gone prepared to take a dip in the water but the riverbed was dry, the water just a silvery trickle in the distance. It wasn’t even summer yet. We could see for ourselves what Sadhguru means when he says our rivers are dying. This is not how it’s supposed to be. A river is a huge presence, a life of its own… we have let things go too far. 

The temple – built by Rajendra Chola I – is in a state of disrepair. The inner shrine (the linga is said to have consecrated by Agastya himself) was barred. We couldn’t go in but we met some officials there, I think they were from the Department of Archeology; restoration, I learned, is on the cards. In the yard, we found a Shivalinga, a samadhi and a pair of hobnailed padukas*, belonging to a yogi who had lived here, and also left at this spot. How wonderful if the temple and the river are restored together! Can you imagine the powerful serenity that could once again emanate from such a combination?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*Edited to add: I unthinkingly called them hobnailed padukas, which doesn't describe them correctly. Hobnails were typically driven under shoes or boots, of course. These are nails or spikes embedded into the wooden base, on which the yogi walks.