Akka Mahadevi: You can confiscate

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You can confiscate

Akka Mahadevi, Akka Mahadevi poetry, Yoga / Hindu, Yoga / Hindu poetry, Shaivite (Shiva) poetry, [TRADITION SUB2] poetry, poetry

by Akka Mahadevi
(12th Century) Timeline

English version by
A. K. Ramanujan

Original Language
Kannada

You can confiscate
money in hand;
can you confiscate
the body's glory?

Or peel away every strip
you wear,
but can you peel
the Nothing, the Nakedness
that covers and veils?

To the shameless girl
wearing the White Jasmine Lord's
light of morning,
you fool,
where's the need for cover and jewel?

-- from Speaking of Siva, by A K Ramanujan

Amazon.com

Themes

Dawn

Light

Recommended Books

	Sacred Voices: Essential Women's Voices Through the Ages, Edited by Mary Ford-Grabowsky
	The Shambhala Anthology of Women's Spiritual Poetry, Edited by Aliki Barnstone
	Speaking of Siva, by A K Ramanujan
	Women Writing in India: 600 BC to the Present: Volume 1, Edited by Susie Tharu / Edited by K. Lalita

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Although increasingly rare, naked sadhus are still found in India. But naked sadvis, female ascetics, like Akka Mahadevi, were shocking even then. She teases prudish listeners by calling herself "the shameless girl," equating herself with a woman who has taken an illicit lover. But her secret lover is "the White Jasmine Lord" -- Shiva.

And she does in fact wear clothing, a gift from her Beloved, his "light of morning." She wears the dawn, the light of enlightenment. What can cover as well as the light that touches everything? What jewel can compare to its dazzle? For Mahadevi the sadvi, there is nothing else worth wearing.

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