Pashupatinath is one of the four holiest sites in Hinduism.  Every Hindu with the means and physical ability attempts to visit in their lifetime. It is dedicated to Shiva, god of destruction, one of the primary three gods in the expansive Hindu pantheon (Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Maintainer and Shiva the Destroyer). We got off the bus in a fog of smoke we knew only too well was the product of the cremation ceremonies that have occurred in this holy place by the Bagmati River for centuries. Sitting across this ancient river, I watched family after family plod, some silent with grief, others wailing with sorrow, towards the river to grace the deceased with the death rites, ending in cremation. Nothing could have prepared me for their bereaved cries as they circumambulated their loved ones robed in vibrant orange cloth. With these emotions, responding to the powerful experience of witnessing this incomprehensible scene, I wrote a small poem.

Cremation-Creation

Anguished cries spew from souls tormented with loss, circling the one robed in vibrant orange robes of final darkness

Four vivid marigolds float by on the wizened river, the silent teacher

Constant as empires of corporeality, now liberated in flames, soar

Beyond the anguish

Farther away than even the tortured cries can reach

Blanketing the skies, scattering the atoms of an old shell

They fall

One rides up and up and up, resting on a craggy peak, kissed by crimson light as the sun awakens the world to a new day

Another rests on veridian grass beneath a blooming daisy, admiring its unfolding golden glory

One more drifts through the open window of a small house in a small village. She lays beside a sleeping child. His tears have dried and now peacefully he rests. Unaware of his mother silently present, resting beside him, a snowy particle of life.

Infinite more spread out and away

Carried on Her winds beyond the known

Through earth, water, fire, air

Into the ether she flies in a final diaspora

Greater than ever before

To start anew