Rudra’s (Com)pos(t)ure
Random ramblings through the net the other day and I catch a glimpse of Shiva’s Rudra Tandava pose in a site…It is like the Ashes smeared all over again (Tamil – we wear Vibhuti or sacred ash to remind ourselves that this body is mortal – From Kannadasan’s “Arthamulla Indumadham”)…
Shiva’s image …the left leg obliquely lifted (and lifting) confidently poised on the half-bent right leg in commune with the earth…Who will save someone facing the wrath of this “half-naked Fakir” (Stolen from Churchill on Gandhi – for Shiva) balanced silently on one leg – eyes flaring in anger, the cosmic flow of death blazing loudly and unambiguously on the Serpent’s eyes?
…Has four hands and interestingly, only one hand holds the Trident as if the actual physicality of the battle is only a consideration. For this wrath..is essential..but not all encompassing…the other two hands dancing and posed in the front, and the third one holds the damroo (I love this word – the word as the verb, the noun, and the sound!!), and half clothes fluttering in the cold wind of Kailasa mountain in the backdrop – all pointing to the universal dance that rattled the skies, held the five elements in unison and control (aka the Tamil song from Shivaji’s “Thiruvillaiyaadal” that “naan asaindaal asaiyum agilam aellaaamae” “as I move, the world sways”) and the soft touch that creates the rainbow, adds a rich slush of sound to the throat of the flying sparrows, and the twisted sky reach to eager Salmon’s jump (eager to return home)…I control them all and it is still a dance…a play…albeit a serious one. This is redemption and ager and ecstasy of the business of running the world flora and fauna, place and elements, living and nonliving.
The Serpent, parallel in look to the direction of trident, composed and comfortably placed to the dancing neck swirled into a Gordian Knot, precariously wound around the poison of the blue neck and the world – like all of us lower mortal, ordinary daily life heroes and ciphers living the daily grind and the joy …
…Has four hands and interestingly, only one hand holds the Trident as if the actual physicality of the battle is only a consideration. For this wrath..is essential..but not all encompassing…the other two hands dancing and posed in the front, and the third one holds the damroo (I love this word – the word as the verb, the noun, and the sound!!), and half clothes fluttering in the cold wind of Kailasa mountain in the backdrop – all pointing to the universal dance that rattled the skies, held the five elements in unison and control (aka the Tamil song from Shivaji’s “Thiruvillaiyaadal” that “naan asaindaal asaiyum agilam aellaaamae” “as I move, the world sways”) and the soft touch that creates the rainbow, adds a rich slush of sound to the throat of the flying sparrows, and the twisted sky reach to eager Salmon’s jump (eager to return home)…I control them all and it is still a dance…a play…albeit a serious one. This is redemption and ager and ecstasy of the business of running the world flora and fauna, place and elements, living and nonliving.
The Serpent, parallel in look to the direction of trident, composed and comfortably placed to the dancing neck swirled into a Gordian Knot, precariously wound around the poison of the blue neck and the world – like all of us lower mortal, ordinary daily life heroes and ciphers living the daily grind and the joy …
The fluttering prayer flags and sacred stones in gleaming ripples of water are not enough to satisfy this man balanced on one leg, balanced on anger and play, power and brevity, fire and ice, reality and perception….
What a crazy Lord!!
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