Grief

 

When grief visits it needs to be accommodated.
No use in wishing it away. Grief is a tenacious guest. 
When grief visits the recently bereaved
and sobs will not be denied,
it's no use pushing it away.
The door is open and grief is here to visit us all.
This grief is everyone's. 
A hush, hush and a there, there or a pull yourself together,
is no way to entertain this guest. 
When grief visits let your own gut and heart ache again in unison,
and all the loved ones passed will come again,
and their absence will become a presence, in grief.
Stand together and let grief have its time.
Grief’s passing through this house with bitter beauty.
Let the door stand open, and honour it.

15 May 2023
© Tina Shettigara

Jai Maa

 

To all mothers
To mothers who are no longer with us
To mothers whose children are no longer with us
To new mothers
To expectant mothers
To the ones who longed to be mothers but missed out
To the ones who have mothered others who were not their own children but have done it with love
To grandmothers
To the Divine Mother herself who births the universe in every moment.
To you.
Love and awe.

Thank you.

Jai Maa!

 

Mother’s Day 2023

 

© Tina Shettigara

Photo of me with offering to Chamundeshwari January 2019, taken by Vittala Shettigara

Morning in Udupi

 

Light filters through eyelids
Sound of rain,
Somewhere, a bell.
Another day begins.

Rolling out the mat
First decent rain of season.
The peacocks call.
Tuning into the body

All sensation in awareness,
The sound of rain,
Kitten mews,
Peacocks cry,

Puja drums, bells,
Sensation, dripping water.
All in awareness,
Awareness is all.

 5 May 2023

 © Tina Shettigara

The forest of great trees

When memories of what went wrong press
mercilessly upon my thoughts at night
or when memory suggests disasters yet to come
and I lie sleepless and tormented;
I go to the forest where the great trees grow
and feel again their bark
and smell again layers of forest scents;
I listen again to the murmuring canopy
and the gentle sounds of creatures in the bush;
again I wrap my arms around those great trunks
and listen to their long memory,
feeling how they do not fret but just be
then and now and in all tomorrows;
again I enter into their infinite calm
and all is well, again.

 

13 May 2022

Thank you to inspiring poet Wendell Berry, whose poem Wild Things has clearly been an inspiration for this outpouring.

Prayer

Deepest reverence to the One
Ardhanariśvara, who is everything.
Deepest reverence to the One
Ardhanariśvarī, who is everything.
The nameless who is named.
Nourish all beings with your stillness,
Knowing the no-word-knowing.
Nourish all beings with the great vibration
Stillness spiralling to sensuality and form.
Show to all beings their Sacred Truth.
For you are the One, who is everything.
May all beings gaze knowingly through
Your eyes, in the glory of no-separation.
May there be peace, peace, peace.

This poem arose during an event during WOMADelaide 2022, with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra layering music and silence. It took the Lord's Prayer structure but gave it, to me, a deeper truth. Ardhanariśvara is Śiva and Ardhanariśvarī is Śakti in this imaging of the half male and half female deity. It is an expression of the One Consciousness out of which everything emerges.

Surrender into the Belovéd

The invitation comes: lean into the Belovéd. 

Trust, surrender to the embrace of none other
than God. You must let yourself dissolve,

so risk it; just lean into the Belovéd.
Easy said. I resist. Don’t smother
me, I cannot give in, however much I crave 

release. How long before my fear dissolves? 
Leaning instead into the scent of mother
as she passes. She disappears, elusive.

Risk it. Just lean into the Belovéd.
Then, when the soft wings of Infinity covered
my naked vulnerability with love,

surrender undid me and I dissolved.                
A bird sang; it’s me singing. There’s no “other”;
the Belovéd resolves into the loved,

moment to moment, there is none other,
no sister, wife, daughter, mother.
Guard dropped, leaning into the Belovéd, 
surrender undid me and I dissolved.

© Tina Shettigara 2022

Heart's Yearning

 

The One for whom I yearn passed by just now.

I know by her lingering perfume.
All I can do is sniff and follow.

Ah Maa,
heart leaning into the beloved’s promise,
eyes blinded by love’s longing,
going in eternal circles,
spiralling inwards on my Self.

© 2021

The black dog

The black dog

When the black dog licks your heart,

Do you believe that it’s a wolf and try to run away?

Don’t you know that’s when it bites?

Don’t you know that’s when it brings you down?

Do you believe in every thought you ever had?

You could keep on chasing thoughts until your days are done.

But when the black dog licks your heart

What if you welcomed it instead?

What if you welcomed it instead?

I thought I knew I couldn’t cope.

I thought the weight would crush my chest.

I thought I had to slam that gate,

I thought to place that dog in chains.

Now when that feeling licks my heart,

It's raw, it's tender, a kiss of love,

I sense the wound that it’s nursing there,

I sense the scar dissolving now.

I sense the scar dissolving now.

© Tina Shettigara

10 July 2020

Don Quixote dreams of rainbows

Don Quixote dreams of rainbows

We loved each other’s company as teens

and it still holds true

so many years later.

There is nothing quite like the intimate captivity

of a long country drive

to test relationships,

ours so recently re-kindled.

Today the light was enchanting.

It rained and rained this morning,

Wet still, and cold, at noon, heading out,

clouds haunt the windmills,

green bursting from paddocks.

Who are you?

conversation exploring the contours of our mutual question.

Histories.

Motivations.

Creativity.

Families.

Light and shade, rain and mist, dance on the hills.

Oh, the fun we had, the shopping, lunch, the laughter.

And the drive back, through the hills, the rain gone,

the windfarms stand clear.

Suddenly on the road, not road-kill, but a teddy.

Poor sodden teddy, so pre-loved, lost and abandoned on the road.

We call him Don Quixote, because of the windmills.

A magic rainbow stands bright-clear in front of hills,

the gold of friendship.

Inside and out we are laughing, squealing with delight,

two old ladies, like teens again.

We stray to the sensitive places where we don’t agree.

Religion.

Your mystical experience. And mine. They do not match.

Is this fear? This flutter in the gut? Trepidation? Excitement?

Hope? for a resolution in this tension.

We let it hang. Again.

Don Quixote is left to dry on your veranda.

We part, planning our next reunion.

Love is here between us, the love of friends

Forged long ago, and yet as real today,

warm, and fuzzy and safe.

© Tina Shettigara
3 July 2020

Don Quixote after a bath and a brush

Wind turbines in fog

Visiting Feelings

Visiting Feelings

Cold spreading like ice across the shoulders
skin alert with goosebumps,
fingers and toes trending to numbness.
Fingers around the mug, liquid warm inside.

Spring’s first sunshine touches skin,
warmth interpenetrating, soaking body,
soft breeze caresses sleeveless skin, jaw melts.
In shade cool chill winter lingers still.

Summer heat sears eyeballs,
desiccated mouth saliva stripped,
candle wax flesh, energy, melts, droops.
Iced drink, gullet cold, seeping.

When joints ache, or pain scorches
muscle, organ, bone; when dentist drills
or some wounded place inflames;
feeling the place that does not hurt.

Tiredness visiting, heavy fatigue in body or brain.
Or alertness zinging the whole body alive.
Feelings are visiting; and visiting opposite feelings.
No resisting, surrender, just be.

© Tina Shettigara September 2019
with a nod to Lauren Rubenstein, inspirer.

Inspiration for this poem came from the wonderful children's book, Visiting Feelings. I recommend it for children and adults. Check it out: https://www.amazon.com.au/s?k=Visiting+feelings&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss

Insight

Insight

To know who I am I sit and wait.
Nothing to do but sense the silent buzz
of the living body as dynamic delight,
a vibrant effervescence and pizzazz
inside and out. I sparkle, zing and fizz
and all that’s here is potency and might.
Thoughts abate yet consciousness remains,
that spirit seer in whom it all unfolds;
this shimmering, she created, she sustains.
Becoming the seen, in body form she moulds
her energy as clay, and just as easily dissolves
it all back to herself again.
All in a flash I am that consciousness
Moment to moment unfolding the universe.

How to meditate

How to meditate

Drop your mind off at child-care.

It cannot go where you are bound.

Kindly say you will be back, then go.

And when it calls and cries, don’t turn.

Instead, sense your way into the pure nowness

of sensation. Every corner is alive.

Stay there. Stay. She who is all there is

Will reveal Herself, as you.

Stay.

As long as it takes. Stay.

Silence

Fully empty.

Stay.

Sense now the streaming thrum

Of everything. Thy will be done.

© Tina Shettigara 2019

Sequoia lovers: a villanelle

Sequoia lovers: a villanelle

As lovers to each other these two trees are drawn

And reach upward to infinity’s meeting place,

While woven roots entwined, resist the storm.

As lovers whose hearts, one to one, are drawn

Through all eternity, their limbs embrace

And succour and support flow, one to one;

Entwined, their woven roots resist the storm.

Rock disallows a tap root down to brace,

Yet fingers, weaving outwards, shall not be torn.

As lovers to each other, day, night and dawn

Inseparable, these two their spirits do co-enlace

And in each other’s strength, each is relied upon,

With woven roots that cannot be undone,

And as ages pass their twoness they misplace

As into each other eternally they are grown.

So may it be, with lovers, cross all space

That they should strengthen each with endless grace,

Lean into each other, as lovers, tightly drawn,

Enmesh their base, and so resist the storm.

©Tina Shettigara 2014

https://www.hikespeak.com/trails/north-grove-calaveras-big-trees-state-park-hike/

Giant Sequoia have a shallow matted root system and no tap root. For such a massive tree it looks odd to find them so commonly growing very close together, however this is advantageous to them as by entwining their roots they give each other stability. I love big trees and always feel quite moved by them.  They are ancient giants, and this "twinning" seemed to me to be totally romantic.

This poem arose to honour the wedding of my eldest daughter. It is therefore dedicated to Chaitanya and Dan.

Day after the seige

Day after the siege

Day after the siege

eyes met, embraces shared.

Connected oneness.

Day after the siege.

When senselessness looms

We all reach out to connect

Day after the siege

We affirm this is not us

We connect, are one.

Tina Shettigara December 17 2014

Enlighten me

Enlighten me

There’s something wrong with the tube light.

It’s flickering on and off, on and off.

You might say that’s better than when it was off all the time

and I was crashing about in the dark and banging into things.

So much suffering.

Then it came on and everything was so obvious …

for some timeless moments …

before it went off again.

But there was a faint halo left

so I couldn’t forget its brilliance,

and I yearn for that light.

Other timeless moments have happened along the way.

Suddenly being in the light

and then the darkness closing round,

forgetting, almost.

Then it started this flickering business.

This strobing effect is really quite distracting.

It’s driving me mad.

Sometimes I feel drunk,

sometimes nauseous,

sometimes dizzy

with all this on again, off again

state of affairs.

But now I see there’s nothing wrong with the light.

It’s on all the time, but I can’t keep my eyes open.

Time to wake up darling. You’re dreaming.

© Tina Shettigara September 2018

https://www.statnews.com/2019/02/06/detecting-consciousness-in-flickering-brain-signals/

On returning from retreat

On returning from retreat, Frankston June 2016

So, how was retreat?

I have become breakfast, tissues scintillating like Coco Pops;
I am spread thinner than vegemite with the butter showing through.
I have become the sound of softly falling rain.
I am champagne feeling the bubbles rise and burst.
As ripples circling around the duck on the pond
I ripple in all directions.
Driving, I am flying, senses spread from horizon to horizon
the air blowing through me.
Rolling to the red light, I cease to exist in stillness.
I am spread taut across the universe
so the Beloved can play infinite rhythms
upon my membranes.
Delight is shimmering here, and there, can’t you feel it?

It was lovely, thank you.

©Tina Shettigara 2016

[Note for non-Australians: the Australian national breakfast spread, Vegemite, is hated by just about everyone else in the world, probably because when they first try it they spread it thick like jam. The only way to eat Vegemite is to spread it very thin.]

https://www.theodysseyonline.com/6-misconceptions-about-vegemite

Ducks on the pond, Brahma Kumari Centre Frankston, photo: Tina Shettigara

When Galahs show the way

When galahs show the way

Braking at yet another red light

The pressure under foot echoes dense anxiety in belly and in heart:

Running late.

But there, a row of galahs on the light pole

Lined up on the horizontal beam

Dozens of them; but they don’t quite fit

And one is relegated to the descending curve,

Slides and must take wing, flies around and wedges into the row;

Birds adjusting, and the one now on the end, sliding, taking wing,

Flying around, edging into the row;

And another slides off the end, and so it goes.

Cocooned I cannot hear their calls

The screeching chatter I know must be there.

But I am captivated and my belly laughs,

The dense knot releases, the light turns green and soon I arrive,

Heart full of joy, present and not late.

Tina Shettigara © 2016

This light pole is not even remotely like the one in the poem and there were way more galahs. Credit: https://hiveminer.com/Tags/galah%2Cgalahs where you will see many more galah pictures.

It was a pole like this,
let your imagination do the rest

I was driving past the actual location and saw these galahs on a nearby pole, so stopped to take their photo.
They waited just long enough for one snap. Taken with my smart phone.

For breasts

For breasts

A blessing in the style of John O'Donohue

We are grateful for breasts.

For breasts which nurtured us

Over whose gracious curve

Is the joining with the mother gaze

Not separate, we are grateful.

For the soft breasts of grandmother’s hugs

That heal a grazed knee

We are grateful.

For pimple breasts

Hidden by folded arms and hunched shoulders

Heralding impending womanhood,

For the blossoming of girl into woman;

And for breasts that are caressed within their first bra,

Suddenly shapely,

We are grateful.

We are grateful

For breasts, pressed in hugs from

mothers, sisters, aunts, grandmothers, girlfriends and lovers.

For breasts ripened into glowing fruit,

And breasts which are pressed, caressed in passion

We are grateful.

We are grateful for breasts which give suckle to our babes.

We are grateful.

And yet when breasts must sacrifice to prolong our

Time with the beloved ones,

We are grateful,

Knowing

we

are

not

those

breasts.

In all these changes,

Bound by time and space

we are not this.

Yet we are grateful

For love and life.

©Tina Shettigara

Ambogio Begognone "Madonna Lactans" c1485: Accademia Carrara, Bergamo

The Ballad of Heartfelt Desire

The Ballad of Heartfelt Desire

Dedicated to Richard Miller on his 70^th birthday 13 April 2018

I sat still, a little child,

Spread myself across the air,

I knew that I was so vast,

Beyond that speck down there.

More than body, more than mind,

More than a tinge of fear,

More than girl, more than a child

Who let go a lonely tear.

Couldn’t climb or run as fast

Couldn’t throw or catch a ball

Couldn’t add or multiply

And my hair wouldn’t take a curl.

A lesser body and lesser mind

And a growing bunch of fears

That I was just not good enough

And freely ran the tears.

Scarcely knew how deep I yearned

To know myself as vast as space

And so much more than belief and fear,

To be still in a state of grace.

Deep gratitude to the teacher dear

Who unlocked my heart to its goal,

The boundaries are blurring now

To the vast non-separate soul.

Tina Shettigara© 2018

The beach at sunset

The beach at sunset

We sat down together on the sea wall, you and I.

Birds flew, boats sailed, homeward, purposefully,

as an orange-red blush emblazoned all the sky,

and the sun’s gold disk slipped into the sea.

We sat down, separate, as a me and you,

and watched beach revellers packing up their day,

dogs walking their people, joggers pounding through,

together, watching, with nothing much to say.

Yet as the glorious sunset blush took hold,

and the sky and sea were tinted in turquoise,

the sense of I, you, them and that dissolved,

replaced by one, in perfect equipoise.

Then I and you returned, and all that’s left is this

memory, yearning and an aftertaste of bliss.

© Tina Shettigara 2015