
Poetry, Diwali
Lakshmi’s Whisper of Light
A Diwali poem
Diwali, the “Festival of Lights” celebrates the Goddess, in her many forms (Lakshmi being one of them), bringing light into places where there had been only darkness, a celebration of good over evil.
This poem celebrates both the Goddess and the concepts of duality and unity, in which creation and pure consciousness coalesce with one another to create manifested consciousness.
Riding the froth of the sea, ebony tresses streaming in the gaze of the moon, Lakshmi whispers, “light.”
The horizon heaves, and the earth, her mother — undulating mountains of female flesh — stretches into being, awakening her daughter, Ushas, who spreads her ribboned robes of dawn across the sky, then leaps to her feet, plunging her daggers of insight into the darkness of night’s breast.
Her father’s voice sighs through the seas, an echo of a time before seeing, whispers heard in dreams.
Swayed in his eternal embrace, the Goddess, she rides the surf of time, aligning the tapestry of mankind into patchworks of good and evil, knowing that in order to truly see one from the other, they both must feather the edge of the sea, and the vault of the sky.
The sheening of sunlight on lapping waves of “being” bathes her in beauty and mystery and a sense of the fleetingness of time.
And still she rides, astride her lotus throne, skimming the sea of consciousness.
I wish you the happiest of Diwalis. May your inner light shine brightly.
Erika Burkhalter is a yogi, neurophilosopher, cat-mom, photographer, and lover of travel and nature, spreading her love and amazement for Mother Earth’s glories, one photo, poem or story at a time. (MS Neuropsychology, MA Yoga Studies).
I hope you enjoyed my photos and musings.
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Photos and story ©Erika Burkhalter. All rights reserved.






