Ocean 2 comments

13 Jun 2003 @ 17:25, by Quidnovi I have a third eye in the middle of my forehead. I am creation and destruction, Life and Death, Good, Evil, the Union of opposites. I dance inside a circle of fire. I hold a rattle drum in one hand. This is the drum of Creation, the drum that beats to the rhythm of Time. In my other hand, is a flame. The fire that devours the world. Both the flame and the drum mark the Dance. My hand is raised upon the altar, the gesture of the Roman Emperors, of Buddha, of Christ; the stance we take when we swear to tell the truth. The hand calls. Have no fear. I dance in the mind of those who see. I am the most enigmatic of Deities. I have revealed myself as a monster, a madman, a beggar. I sit lost in meditation on a mountain in the Himalayas. My legs are pillars, my body a shrine, my head a crown of gold. Things that stand will fall, but motion last forever. I carry a shaving bowl to the edge of the river. I balance it on my head and walk slowly into the water. I wade out over my eyes. I disappear. The bowl fills. When I surface, I make my way to shore without spilling a single drop. I have grown a beard and I am covered with weeds...the dry land of every days...also an Ocean. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Text: from Ocean (Brazzaville and Joe Frank) More Joe Frank ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shiva Nataraja The upper right hand of the dancing figure holds a little drum shaped like an hourglass, the rhythm of which is the world-creating beat of time, which draws a veil across the face of eternity, projecting temporality and thereby the temporal world. The extended left hand holds the flame of spiritual light that burns the veil away, thus annihilating the world and revealing the void of eternity. The second right hand is in the "fear-dispelling" posture, and the second left, lifted accross the chest, pointing to the raised left foot, is in a position known as "elephant hand," signifying "teaching": for where an elephant has gone through jungles all animals can follow. The left foot, to which the "teaching hand" points, is lifted to symbolize "release," while the right stamping on the back of a dwarf named "Forgetfulness" drives souls into the votex of rebirth. The dwarf is gazing in fascination at the poisonous world-serpent, representing thus man's psychological attraction to the realm of his bondage in unending birth, suffering, and death. The god's head, meanwhile, is poised, serene and still, in the midst of all the movement of creation and destruction represented in the rhythme of the rocking arms and slowly tamping right heel. His right earring is a man's, his left a woman's; for he includes and transcends opposites. His streaming hair is that of a yogi, flying now however in a dance of life. Among its strands is tucked a skull, but also a crescent moon; a datura flower, from the plant of which an intoxicant is distilled: and finally, a tiny image of the goddess Ganges---for it is Shiva, we are told, who receives on his head the first impact of that heavenly stream as it falls to earth from on high. From the mouths of a double-headed mythological water monster called a makara the flaming aureole issues by which the dancer is enclosed; and the posture of his head, arms, and lifted leg within this frame suggests the sign of the syllable OM: ---Joseph Campbell, "The Mythic Image"

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