The Diadem Dark, Divine

The Crown of Glory,
The matted monarch curl,
The mighty multi-millioned strand,
This ever-static eternal emblem of this God;
This Sign of Him, who dances
On the cold snow of congealed hearts;
This Charm of Him, who drives the herd,
Bordered gold with sunset dust;
The hair that sprinkles Grace, like April rain;
This triumphal arch of majesty
For this solar super orb;
The hair that is softest for the sight
(So heavy it looks you often doubt
Can this little frame carry all this weight?)
This foil for the fairest face on earth,
This umbra for the ultimate universal Light,
Umbrella that shades stricken hearts,
This flag, this mark, this hairy heraldry,
That my Lord has chosen as the unique sign
For His mystery and His mastery;
This splendor, supreme, supernal,
This spiraled sublimity,
This awe-inspiring headgear grand,
This heavenly halo,
This coiled composite carefree coiffure;
He twists and turns around, around
The wisps of wayward hair;
He rolls it on His rollicking finger fast
(He cannot but; His joy it overleaps)
In cascades and in curves;
The hair of the Lord is a mile an inch-
This bushy beneficent bliss,
This jungle of jangled joy;
It is thick as the thirsts that torment the mind
For, He has to bear them all.
“Bring all your griefs, your loss and pain-
This mass of hair shall bear them all,” He says.
“This is a ‘for-rest’ for your rest.”
Each hair can bear a nation’s woe;
The cluster can carry the Universe, or even worse.
If you but peer into the curls
You can see the silver crescent, casting opal glow
Amidst the tangled silk;
The hair hallucinates and holds the eye
In sinuous snaky bonds;
The Ganga gleams in shimmering waves
Midst those cavernous depths;
The peacock plume, you can discern,
Fluttering proud in Jumna breeze.
The locks, the mats, the convolutes,
That humble man has pictured on the head of God
The serpent crested jewel that He adorns
The Divine Head designed by Him, for His own joy-
Are all upon this wondrous bunch
Of sable sovereignty.
And O, the charm that dawns,
The glory that it helps reveal,
The healing shade it casts,
The hope of harvest,
This cluster of rain heavy clouds does bring
To parched breasts of grief!
This Night of Rest, Repose,
For tired eyes and hands and hearts;
The crown of hair;
(The tamas)
Above this face of Grace,
(The satwic splendor)
The crimson gown,
(The Rajas charm)
O, may this picture of the Diadem Divine
Be ever ever imprinted
On the cleanliness of our heats.

                          ~N. Kasturi
                          [Read in the Divine Presence: 10-10-67]
                        Source: Sanathana Sarathi, Nov. 1967