A Short (English) Poetic Description of the different Forms of the Divine Mother

[Guest guest]

>> 1.Kali

>> ------

>> All here is a mystery of contraries;

>> Darkness a magic of self-hidden light,

>> Suffering some secret rapture's tragic mask

>> And death an instrument of perpetual life. "

>>

>>

>> 2.Tara

>> ------

>> I guide man to the path of the Divine

>> And guard him from the red Wolf and the Snake

>> I set in his mortal hand my heavenly sword

>> And put on him the breast-plate of the Gods.

>> I break the ignorant pride of human mind

>> And lead the thought to the wideness of the Truth;

>> I rend man's narrow and successful life

>> And force his sorrowful eyes to the gaze at the sun

>> That he may die to earth and live in his soul.

>> I know the goal, I know the secret route,

>> I have studied the map of the invisible worlds

>> I am the battle's head, the journey's star.

>>

>>

>> 3.Tripurasundari

>> ----------------

>> All here shall be one day her sweetness's home,

>> All contraries prepare her harmony;

>> Towards her our knowledge climbs, our passion

>> gropes,

>> In her miraculous rapture we shall dwell,

>> Her clasp will turn to ecstasy our pain.

>> Our self shall be one self with all through her.

>> In her confirmed because transformed in her,

>> Our life shall find its fulfilled response

>> Above, the boundless hushed beautitudes,

>> Below, the wonder of the embrace divine.

>>

>>

>> 4.Bhuvaneshwari

>> ---------------

>> A vast Unknown is around us and within;

>> All things are wrapped in the dynamic One:

>> A subtle link of union joins all life.

>> Thus all creation is a single chain.

>>

>>

>> 5.Tripura Bhairavi

>> ------------------

>> This is our deepest need to join once more

>> What now is parted, opposite and twain,

>> Remote in sovereign spheres that never meet

>> Or fronting like far poles of Night and Day

>> We must fill the immense lacuna we have made,

>> Re-wed the closed finite's lonely consonant

>> With the open vowels of Infinity,

>> A hyphen must connect Matter and Mind,

>> The narrow isthumus of the ascending soul:

>> We must renew the secret bond in things,

>> Our hearts recall the lost divine Idea,

>> Reconstitute the perfect word, unite

>> The Alpha and Omega in one sound;

>> Then shall the spirit and Nature be at one.

>> Two are the ends of the mysterious plan.

>>

>>

>> 6.Chinnamasta

>> -------------

>> In his wide sky she built her world anew;

>> She gave to mind's calm peace the motor's speed,

>> To thinking a need to live what the soul saw,

>> To living an impetus to know and see.

>> His splendour grasped her, her puissance to him

>> clung;

>> She crowned the Idea a king in purple robes,

>> Put her magic serpent sceptre in Thought's grip,

>> Made forms his inward vision's rhythmic shapes

>> And her acts the living body of his will

>> A flaming thunder, a creators flash,

>> His victor Light rode on her deathless Force:

>> A centaur's mighty gallop bore the god.

>> Life throned with mind, a double majesty.

>>

>>

>> 7.Dhumavati

>> -----------

>> There in the slumber of the cosmic Will

>> He saw the secret key of Nature's change.

>>

>>

>> 8.Bagalamukhi

>> -------------

>> They follow the unseen leader in the heart,

>> Their lives obey the inner nature's law.

>> There is kept grandeur's store, the hero's mould:

>> The soul is the watchful builder of its fate.

>>

>>

>> 9.Matangi

>> ---------

>> Attention to an unseen Truth they seize

>> A sound as of invisible augur wings

>> Voices of an unplumbed significance,

>> Mutterings that brood in the core of Matter's sleep.

>> In the heart's profound audition they can catch

>> The murmurs lost by life's uncaring ear,

>> A prophet speech in thought's omniscient trance.

>>

>>

>> 10.Kamalatmika

>> --------------

>> The world's senseless beauty mirrors God's delight

>> That rapture's smile is secret everywhere;

>> It flows in the wind's breath, in the tree's sap,

>> Its hued magnificance blooms in leaves and flowers.

 

 

>>

[Guest guest]

Shankar, we will also use some of these in our meditation service -

thank you for passing these along, so beautiful!

 

-- Karen

 

Shankar wrote:

 

> >> 1.Kali

> >> ------

> >> All here is a mystery of contraries;

> >> Darkness a magic of self-hidden light,

> >> Suffering some secret rapture's tragic mask

> >> And death an instrument of perpetual life. "

> >>

> >>

> >> 2.Tara

> >> ------

> >> I guide man to the path of the Divine

> >> And guard him from the red Wolf and the Snake

> >> I set in his mortal hand my heavenly sword

> >> And put on him the breast-plate of the Gods.

> >> I break the ignorant pride of human mind

> >> And lead the thought to the wideness of the Truth;

> >> I rend man's narrow and successful life

> >> And force his sorrowful eyes to the gaze at the sun

> >> That he may die to earth and live in his soul.

> >> I know the goal, I know the secret route,

> >> I have studied the map of the invisible worlds

> >> I am the battle's head, the journey's star.

> >>

> >>

> >> 3.Tripurasundari

> >> ----------------

> >> All here shall be one day her sweetness's home,

> >> All contraries prepare her harmony;

> >> Towards her our knowledge climbs, our passion

> >> gropes,

> >> In her miraculous rapture we shall dwell,

> >> Her clasp will turn to ecstasy our pain.

> >> Our self shall be one self with all through her.

> >> In her confirmed because transformed in her,

> >> Our life shall find its fulfilled response

> >> Above, the boundless hushed beautitudes,

> >> Below, the wonder of the embrace divine.

> >>

> >>

> >> 4.Bhuvaneshwari

> >> ---------------

> >> A vast Unknown is around us and within;

> >> All things are wrapped in the dynamic One:

> >> A subtle link of union joins all life.

> >> Thus all creation is a single chain.

> >>

> >>

> >> 5.Tripura Bhairavi

> >> ------------------

> >> This is our deepest need to join once more

> >> What now is parted, opposite and twain,

> >> Remote in sovereign spheres that never meet

> >> Or fronting like far poles of Night and Day

> >> We must fill the immense lacuna we have made,

> >> Re-wed the closed finite's lonely consonant

> >> With the open vowels of Infinity,

> >> A hyphen must connect Matter and Mind,

> >> The narrow isthumus of the ascending soul:

> >> We must renew the secret bond in things,

> >> Our hearts recall the lost divine Idea,

> >> Reconstitute the perfect word, unite

> >> The Alpha and Omega in one sound;

> >> Then shall the spirit and Nature be at one.

> >> Two are the ends of the mysterious plan.

> >>

> >>

> >> 6.Chinnamasta

> >> -------------

> >> In his wide sky she built her world anew;

> >> She gave to mind's calm peace the motor's speed,

> >> To thinking a need to live what the soul saw,

> >> To living an impetus to know and see.

> >> His splendour grasped her, her puissance to him

> >> clung;

> >> She crowned the Idea a king in purple robes,

> >> Put her magic serpent sceptre in Thought's grip,

> >> Made forms his inward vision's rhythmic shapes

> >> And her acts the living body of his will

> >> A flaming thunder, a creators flash,

> >> His victor Light rode on her deathless Force:

> >> A centaur's mighty gallop bore the god.

> >> Life throned with mind, a double majesty.

> >>

> >>

> >> 7.Dhumavati

> >> -----------

> >> There in the slumber of the cosmic Will

> >> He saw the secret key of Nature's change.

> >>

> >>

> >> 8.Bagalamukhi

> >> -------------

> >> They follow the unseen leader in the heart,

> >> Their lives obey the inner nature's law.

> >> There is kept grandeur's store, the hero's mould:

> >> The soul is the watchful builder of its fate.

> >>

> >>

> >> 9.Matangi

> >> ---------

> >> Attention to an unseen Truth they seize

> >> A sound as of invisible augur wings

> >> Voices of an unplumbed significance,

> >> Mutterings that brood in the core of Matter's sleep.

> >> In the heart's profound audition they can catch

> >> The murmurs lost by life's uncaring ear,

> >> A prophet speech in thought's omniscient trance.

> >>

> >>

> >> 10.Kamalatmika

> >> --------------

> >> The world's senseless beauty mirrors God's delight

> >> That rapture's smile is secret everywhere;

> >> It flows in the wind's breath, in the tree's sap,

> >> Its hued magnificance blooms in leaves and flowers.

> >>