The Cauliflower (10 page)

2. Kali is a creative, dynamic, destructive force who is both good
and
bad. She is
Dakshina
Kali (the loving Kali who grants boons and blessings) and she is
Smashan
Kali (the terrible, terrifying form, who destroys).
Smashan
Kali is traditionally worshipped in cremation grounds. These are places of ash and decay, burned bones, bad smells, and jackals.

In the west it could be argued that we sublimate this special “spiritual mood” into our phases of simmering teenage angst, or when we read books about vampires and ghosts, or watch horror films, or when we dye our hair black and become goths and listen to Joy Division or Marilyn Manson. When we celebrate Halloween, even. It's the same fundamental impulse, and a curious irony, too, that a sense of comfort/release is sometimes felt when we actively go out of our way to embrace the sweet and sticky black treacle of darkness.

Kali's famous cremation ground is a location in which it is suddenly rather easy to renounce the body and the
ego
(a bleak and despairing place—how can we possibly evade the truth of death and decomposition here?), but it is also, and equally importantly, a place where we may master something even more powerful than our
ego
(or our attraction to life and the living), and that's our deep-seated fears and aversions. Our aversions are even more difficult to eliminate and overcome than our natural human weakness for cheap thrills and attractions. A true saint feels neither attraction
nor
repulsion
nor
fear.

3. People happily and readily love Kali in both of her main forms (in fact, she has countless forms—there is a custom-built Kali for all occasions) because even though she may
appear
to both bless us/nourish us and kill us/destroy us, she actually does neither. Our world is just a kind of transitory dream, an illusion. We exist on a relative plane. The Hindus call this earthly realm
maya
. And what takes place here is only divine play—a game. Life and death are inconsequential. To move beyond
maya
you must consciously stop playing the game; then Kali may spare you and free your soul to unite with God, with
Brahman
, who is the ultimate reality, in a place and state of incontrovertible truth and infinite bliss.

Life is illusion. It is
maya
. Kali is the puppet master. We are the puppets. She may stoop and cut our strings if she feels the sudden impulse. But take nothing for granted here. She is perplexingly coquettish and a creature of strange whims.

4. Kali spits out her tongue not as a gesture of defiance, but as an expression of embarrassment or coyness because she has (during the course of an orgy of vengeance and destruction) accidentally stepped onto the prostrate body of her beloved husband, Shiva (Shiva, who is not dead, just deathly pale and smeared in the white ash of renunciation, has lain in front of his wife to try and curtail her inexhaustible wrath). Kali is fierce, but confused. On a purely symbolic level, Kali's tongue is red and represents
rajas
, or activity, but this tongue is held between her white teeth, and white is the color of
sattva
, or purity and spirituality. Her passion is restrained by purity, or, in other words, by God.

5. The fifty skulls that Ma Kali wears around her neck represent the fifty letters of the ancient
Sanskrit
alphabet. Kali creates worlds and she creates words. The ancient concept of the
Logos
is contained here and originates here (long before Saint John thought of it or wrote about it in his exquisite gospel), nestled in the musky bosom of the Black Mother.

6. Kali's name comes from the word
kala
, or “time.” Time consumes everything. Kali is black because she
is
time, and she has destroyed everything. She is a giant vacuum, an endless, dark void. She is inscrutable. The ignorant devotee can only really see her from a distance. She is similar to the night sky. Draw up close and (like God, or
Brahman
, who is ultimately formless) she will simply disappear.

*poof!*

7. Kali's hair is in disarray because she is wild. She is an all-singing, dervish-dancing, ecstatically stomping, bloody-sword-wielding Beyoncé Knowles. She sings to her own crazy tune. She is utterly unfettered. She is fearless. She is free.

8. Kali's priests at the temple may dress her image in priceless
sari
s and cover her with precious scents and expensive jewelry—this is how they honor her, it is all a part of their divine service—but Kali herself may never be dressed. She may never be curtailed. Can you dress a storm? Can you bejewel the wind? For this reason Kali is called
Digambari
: she who is naked.

9. Kali cannot exist without Shiva, her husband, but Shiva (who, as he lies flat and pale at her feet, represents the blinding light of infinite consciousness) cannot manifest his destructive power without his wife, Kali. Creation and destruction are an endless cycle. One cannot exist without the other. They are two opposites, eternally conjoined. This is an eternal love affair.

10. The girdle of arms around Kali's waist represents work or action. The arms symbolize her creative energy. They also represent—at some level—the pointlessness of all human endeavor. Everything we build will ultimately be destroyed. Nothing we do may last forever.

11. Kali provides a source of delirious bliss to her devotees (Kali herself reels about drunkenly, high on this blissful intoxication, but also, perhaps, on blood lust after slaughtering copious demons) through the physical mechanism of what Hindus call the
kundalini
. Kali's energy is sourced at the base of the human spine. It extends down to a point just below the anus and then rises up to the crown of the head, traveling through the heart, the base of the throat, and the point between your eyes, at the top of your nose,
en route
. Her power writhes and vibrates like a snake through this channel. But it is a dangerous, overwhelming, and ecstatic energy to release, and very difficult to control once you have. Play with it at your peril, girls and boys.

12. Illustrious Ma Kali, Mother of the Universe, your blissful power, it seems, is infinite. But how may our pens hope to describe this infinity without promptly running out of ink? How may your great bliss be expressed by our mean and paltry descriptions of it? How may the dreadful fire of your ecstasy be controlled within our fleshy torsos? How, how,
how
may the creatress of all words (of language) be clumsily manacled by their petty meanings?

How indeed?

Sri Ramakrishna on Truth:

“Always speak the truth—

The tusks of an elephant

Can't be retracted.”

Winter 1857, at the Dakshineswar Kali Temple (six miles north of Calcutta)

Uncle has gone completely mad. And who am I? Who is Hridayram Mukhopadhyay—still so young and strong and full of promise, tall and handsome, once his dear mother's greatest hope. Who is he? Yes! The servant of a madman! And is not the servant of a madman a madman also? Ah! How can this stain not stick?

I am Uncle's shadow, his keeper, his watchman, his guard. I am tied to Uncle by the clinging vines of love. And I live in a state of dreadful doubt and confusion. I live in profound uncertainty. I am sick with worry and anxiety. Not unlike poor Uncle himself.

Poor Uncle hardly sleeps! I carry his towel and water pot to the pine grove at 3:00 a.m. when Uncle answers the call of nature. I say nothing. I am fearful. And then on to the
ghat
, where Uncle washes himself. I say nothing. I am fearful. And then he sits and I carefully smear his emaciated body with oil. Still saying nothing. Still fearful.

But this is a good day. On a bad day Uncle will not clean himself. Uncle will roll in the dirt on the banks of the Ganga, hour after hour, howling and weeping. He has a tantrum. He calls for Ma Kali like a child bleating for its mother. He cries with such yearning that the crowds form around him. “Isn't this the young temple priest?” they ask. “Has his mother just died?”

What can I say? How do I explain to them? Uncle suffers so dreadfully. Because Uncle has such a longing to see the Mother, and she will not appear to him. Ma Kali eludes Uncle. Uncle's charms will not work on her. And Uncle cannot stand it.

He spends all his days in prayer and in worship and in
japa
. He will not eat. Like an angry child, a spoiled child, Uncle is fractious. He will not rest. He grinds his teeth. He whimpers and wrings his hands.

And I am fractious, too. I must guard Uncle. At night—if I close my eyes for just a second—he disappears, and I must then go out and find him. Where is he? Where has Uncle gone?
Uncle?
Where are you?
Uncle! Uncle!
Come back!

Oh why, oh why must Uncle play such games?

I am so tired. I am worn down with Uncle. I must cover for him at the Temple, but every moment as I perform the
arati
—as I wave burning camphor before Ma Kali or offer her choice morsels of food—I am thinking only of Uncle. Where is he? What might Uncle be doing? What scandal might now be unfolding while I, Hriday, faithful Hridayram, am not there to extinguish the flames?

Uncle has taken to wandering alone in the jungle at night. His bare feet sliced and pricked by spiky plants. Surrounded by a halo of biting insects. Stalked by wild animals. I am too afraid to follow him there. It's as though Uncle is in a trance. He is lovelorn. Since Ramkumar died Uncle cares for nothing but God. But God eludes him. So Uncle yearns. Uncle is hungry for God. He thirsts for God's nipple. His chapped lips open and close, but often now he is too tired to wail.

Uncle is so thin. He cannot eat. He cannot keep his wearing cloth upon him. It falls off. He does not care. He walks around naked, his chest stained a dark red. I do not know why. And the wind! Uncle has dreadful wind! Uncle is flatulent! Whenever he does appear at the temple—filthy, like a madman—he dances and sings (the strangest songs! the wildest dances!) before Ma Kali and he flatulates with every step. The temple administrators are astonished by Uncle's displays. And the visitors. The pilgrims. They ask, “Who is this lunatic! What is he doing here?” They stare at him in revulsion and horror and fear. It is dreadful! And I am with Uncle. I am Uncle's nephew. They laugh at me behind my back. I hear them! I hear them laughing! But never to my face. I am tall and strong. I will defend our honor even through all of my crippling doubt. I will defend Uncle's honor with my life. Or else my fists. But what am I defending? What has Uncle left us with?

Man is a simple creature. And for the most part the formless
Brahman
is beyond his foolish comprehension. How are we to worship him, then, without using the familiar examples of our daily lives? When we Hindus worship the divine we find many different ways to adore him. We call this worship
bhakti
. Sometimes we like to worship him as his servants—he is our master. Sometimes he is our divine spouse, our lover. Sometimes God is our mother or our father and we throw out our arms for comfort and worship him, moaning, like a child. Or else God is our dearest friend, our great strength and companion through every earthly trial.

Uncle was Ma Kali's neglected suckling. He moaned and moaned, but she would not comfort him. Her dark nipples were full of milk, but she would not feed him so much as a single blessed drop. Uncle could not rest without her comfort. I was always full of doubt. But now Uncle, too, became doubtful. Questions. So many questions. Is the Mother real? he would ask. Am I going mad? he would ask. If Mother is real, then why will she not appear to me? he would ask. Where is Mother? he would ask, striking his chest. Mother! Mother! Hridayram! Why does she still hide from me? he would ask. What have I done wrong, Hriday? Tell me! Tell me! Tell me!

I could not answer. I could only stare. Fear had silenced my tongue. But I could still hear. I could still listen. And what I heard made me yet more fearful. Because there were many complaints about Uncle. The temple guards, the other priests, the administrators, the cooks, they all complained about Uncle. First there were simply mutterings, but then they grew louder. Soon it was a roar. It was only a matter of time until such a great racket must reach the ears of Mathur Baba and the Rani. Then we would be ruined.

One night, when Uncle rose, in secret, and wandered, sobbing, into the jungle, I steeled my nerve and I followed him there. I needed to know where Uncle was going. After a while I saw him pause in a small clearing under a sacred
vilwa
tree. I was some distance away. I was too afraid to draw closer. I saw Uncle calmly remove his wearing cloth and sit down. And then I saw something truly dreadful. I saw Uncle remove his sacred thread and place it onto the ground beside him. What to do? How to respond? I bent over and I picked up a small stone and I threw it at Uncle. Then I picked up another stone, and then another. Soon stones of all sizes were raining down on Uncle. Uncle was deep in meditation, but eventually his eyes flew open and he beheld his nephew.

“What are you doing, Hriday?” he called.

“You have removed your sacred thread, Uncle,” I called back. “What are you thinking, Uncle? This is too much, now, too much! This is not acceptable, Uncle!”

(Was this not the same man who on grounds of caste had refused to eat the temple
prasad
? And now to remove the very symbol of his proud
Brahmin
inheritance?!)

Uncle shrugged. “To see God one must be free of all earthy ties, Hriday, even ties of caste. My
Brahmanical
thread is a source of status and pride. To see the Mother clearly during meditation I must toss aside such fetters.”

I shook my head at Uncle. Then I cast down the remaining stones. What more could I say? What more could I do? I was truly at my wit's end with Uncle. How might I reason with Uncle when Uncle always had an answer to every question I might think to ask him? Uncle has always been possessed of a devilish logic.