Where are you then?

Where are you then?

When the darkness falls,
When the silence prevails,
When the air freezes,
When the stir stops,
When the cricket chirps,
When the life sleeps,
When the bed warms,
When the limbs break,
When the nerves ache,
When the sense fails,
When the eyelids droop,
When the eyeballs squeeze,
When the eyes close,
WHERE ARE YOU THEN?

Aatma Amar Hai

nainam chindanti sastrani
nainam dahati pavakah
na cainam kledayanty apo
na sosayati marutah

SYNONYMS

na--never; enam--this soul; chindanti--can cut to pieces; sastrani--all weapons; na--never; enam--unto this soul; dahati--burns; pavakah--fire; na--never; ca--also; enam--unto this soul; kledayanti--moistens; apah--water; na--never; sosayati--dries; marutah--wind.

TRANSLATION

The soul can never be cut into pieces by any weapon, nor can he be burned by fire, nor moistened by water, nor withered by the wind.

The Shiva Trilogy

Shiva! The Mahadev. The God of Gods. Destroyer of Evil. Passionate lover. Fierce warrior. Consummate dancer. Charismatic leader. All-powerful, yet incorruptible. Quick wit, accompanied by an equally quick and fearsome temper.

Over the centuries, no foreigner who came to India – conqueror, merchant, scholar, ruler, traveller – believed that such a great man could possibly have existed in reality. They assumed that he must have been a mythical God, whose existence could be possible only in the realms of human imagination. Unfortunately, this belief became our received wisdom.

But what if we are wrong? What if Lord Shiva was not a figment of a rich imagination, but a person of flesh and blood? Like you and me. A man who rose to become godlike because of his karma. That is the premise on which the Shiva Trilogy is based. It interprets the rich mythological heritage of ancient India, blending fiction with historical fact.

This work is therefore a tribute to Lord Shiva and the lesson that his life teaches us. A lesson lost in the depths of time and ignorance. A lesson, that all of us can rise to be better people. A lesson, that there exists a potential god in every single human being. All we have to do is listen to ourselves.

Myths are nothing but jumbled memories of a true past. A past buried under mounds of earth and ignorance.

This trilogy is based on this fundamental premise.

I believe that the Hindu gods were not mythical beings or a figment of a rich imagination.

I believe that they were creatures of flesh and blood, like you and me.

I believe that they achieved godhood through their karma, their deeds.

I believe that the words Vishnu and Mahadev are not individual names. They are in fact titles, given to those persons who are the greatest of leaders, who become god-like.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening - Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there's some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

The Road Not Taken - Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Silver - Walter de la Mare

Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;
One by one the casements catch
Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;
Couched in his kennel, like a log,
With paws of silver sleeps the dog;
From their shadowy coat the white breasts peep
Of doves in a silver-feathered sleep;
A harvest mouse goes scampering by,
With silver claws, and silver eye;
And moveless fish in the water gleam,
By silver reeds in a silver stream.