(Written around the time of Devipuram’s 1994 consecration.)
The Lalitā Sahasranāma—the One Thousand Names of the Supreme Goddess, Parāśakti—begins with three stanzas and ends with one, which collectively represent four times of the day: early morning, noon, evening and, lastly, midnight. They also relate to the four seasons of life; that is, birth, growth and decay, plus the activity that brings about a fourth life, the passionate union of Shiva and Shakti. I find these stanzas beautiful beyond compare.
Aruṇāṃ karuṇātaraṅgitākṣīṃ…
(“She is red in color with eyes full of compassion…”)
She rises with the orange glow of early morning, her eyes radiating compassion for her child, the newborn day. She holds the manifold attractions and repulsions of life through the five senses as well as the mind, which seeks pleasure and abhors pain.
Each new day brings forth a new mood—whether of lightness or heaviness, smallness or expansiveness, weakness or power; loss or gain of control over one’s desires, enjoyment, fulfillment and the attainment of all possibilities.
I must enjoy life in the total awareness that I am Shiva. I must penetrate and permeate every nook and corner of this newly manifest world, and remain ever creative.
Dhyāyēt padmāsanasthāṃ vikasita…
(“She has petal-shaped eyes and is seated upon a lotus…”)
I meditate on this new day, in full bloom at noon, filling the entire world with the light that pours forth from her wide-open lotus eyes. This golden girl, nature, wears lush yellows and greens, holding in her hand the golden-yellow lotus, symbol of the shining life of the cosmos.
She is the earthly descent of divine grace and majesty, aesthetically beautiful in her every limb. She has adorned herself in all imaginable jewelry. Nature protects those who worship her; to them she gives her love and bounty.
I must live in tune with her will, expressing love to all without notions of “I” or “mine” polluting my mind. She is auspicious knowledge, the embodiment of peace, worshiped by all beings with divinity. She gives herself and her pleasures to all who love her.
Sa kuṅkuma vilēpanām alika cumbi…
(“Her forehead is kissed by a smear of holy vermilion…”)
I meditate upon the evening of life. Spreading her vermilion hues across the sky, she invites me to merge back into the embers of her womb, from which I came.
Her third eye, which is just beginning to open, is traced with dark lines of musk and kohl. There is the suggestion of a smile in her lovely sidelong glance.
She wields the attraction of release from both the struggles of life and the revulsive fear of impending death. She has governed my mind and nurtured its attachment to the impermanent objects of life. She has enchanted every life form with her fleeting, local beauties.
Her passion knows no bounds, painting red the entire cosmos with her intense desire. I contemplate her, the universal Mother Goddess who keeps telling me, “Live the way I do—passionately!”
And that is the only way to live this transient life. Whatever I may do, I must always remember my truth—that I am the all-pervading existence. I must remember that there is no death. I am all—so how can I ever die?
Sindūrāruṇa vigrahāṃ trinayanāṃ…
(“She is resplendent with a deep red body, three eyes and a crown of rubies set with the crescent moon…”)
Having left its old body behind, life strives to find a new form more suitable to its evolution. It remembers its search in the red womb of the Mother.
The source of all life is she, the Great Womb. Throbbing, pulsating blood makes my passionate Mother’s womb glow orange-red like the morning sky.
She gives birth, she nurtures and she dissolves, weaving an infinite tapestry of intricate patterns—those are her three eyes. In her womb, the starry skies glisten like drops of semen, and the cool sphere of the moon sparkles atop her diadem.
She smiles through her labor, happy to give me birth. Her breasts are ever full of life, giving milk that not only nourishes me but feeds the entire world.
In her hand she holds a red vessel of intoxicating elixir, passion for life, which issues from her clitoris, the seat of pleasure. She holds a red lotus, her vulva open to receive her lover.
She is benevolent. She rests her red-colored foot upon another red treasure vessel, which is the birthing canal.
Why do I share these impressions? Because these stanzas from the Lalitā Sahasranāma represent a set of ideas, a point of view, a perspective on the nature of life and how it should be lived.
We must learn to appreciate the unity of all life. We must learn to love this life, even if it is transient. Because to live it in any other way is to make it miserable and severely limit its infinite richness.
My family is the whole world. To limit it to those nearby is poverty.
If you do not understand Sanskrit (or even if you do), it may help you to read these thoughts when you recite the stanzas to help fix their messages in your mind.
May we all be united in the aesthetic and harmonious intent and purpose of the Goddess, Devi Sahasrākṣī Rājarājēśvarī.
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