In a temple sans history
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Accosted by an old man
attaching to me gingerly like a feather
plucked off the hen that made my lunch
at Velu military hotel nearby,
Here do I stand.
Here do I stand
at the precincts of a temple.
across the evening shadows of a tower
with a pair of conical loudspeakers
apparently diaphragm-dead.
A temple with a tower
with conical loud speakers and
without a speck of
documented history
sculpted on the walls or on
corner pierced copper plates.
A history
I can’t decipher and validate
anyway even if available.
Here stood Kamaraj and
sermoned like a saint.
My guide’s index finger
points down the withdrawing horizon
well, a little lower down there.
Down the horizon there
to the raised platform of mud
with a metre of disused blue electrical cable
kissing passionately a broken fuse box
half buried in red sand.
My Guide waves me into the temple hall
with a wall painted in pale yellow.
A wall painted in yellow with a
thick brush dipped in red varnish
to create Lord Siva
with looks of Sivaji Ganesan
dancing ferociously in
unstable equlibrium and an
enormous belly staying put.
My Guide scratches Siva
near his Linga
with the smile of a known bosom pal
as his dancing comrade winces.
All royal paintings as old as Siva
are here under
the divine artist’s terrestrial co-ordinates:
‘Velu Arts, Mobile 9898989898′.
A weather beaten bicycle
bored with all music
and holiness around
stops at the temple gates.
The monthly paid piper
dismounts with the pipe
carried around shoulder
like a gun disapproving of mayhem.
The piper plays to
complain to the lord
of his bronchospasmic wheezing
since last night,
through his pipe in non-cooperation.
He comes in the lineage
of the great Rajarathnam Pillai and Karukurichi.
My guide in all reverence
cajoles me to pay obeisance
to the man, his pipe and his bicycle.
Ah, this is the temple pond
and yes the temple pond that
with a single immersion into
the stagnant water smelling of algae
will transport one to the land of
Siva with a finger nail scratched linga.
The temple pond, on the stone steps
has an inscription I can decipher-
‘Santhi is a slut’
written in chalk white and pure.
My guide with naked feet
rubs Santhi off the graffiti offensive
announcing proud all the way
‘Actress Kannambaa’s film shooting,
she carrying a pot of water
made there circa 1950′.
The temple priest
perspiring and with a faint smell
of Lifebuoy bath soap
hurries into the sanctorum
well before my Guide
says anything, well, anything.
Did someone ring the temple bells
without a sense of time for worship
making the holy pigeons on the tower
shocked beyond disbelief at the sacrilege
flutter their wings and fly away in protest?
My Guide and I walk out slow as
every good thing in life
has to end, as you know.
My Guide searches for
and finds his slippers
bound with safety pins
near the temple gates
laughing at the jokes on music
of the piper’s bicycle
while I take my haggard wallet.
‘Not a paid service’
with a smile and caved-in stomach
that may have a story of its own
my Guide walks away
from the shadow of the tower
with conical loudspeakers.
A lucky temple with
dancing Siva created by
Velu Arts, mobile 9898989898.
(Era.Murukan March 24 2013)