These short prayers devoted to Śiva were composed by four different saints. Allam Prabhu, Basavaṇṇa, and Mahādēviyakka lived in 12th-century Karnataka, while Dēvara Dāsimayya was born in Mudanuru in the mid-10th century. Each addresses Śiva through a different name: Lord of the Meeting Rivers, Rāmanāta, Lord white as Jasmine, Lord of Caves. Through these many invocations, they celebrate the immense and paradoxical god who creates, protects, transforms, and destroys the universe. The poems are deeply poetic, filled with images drawn from nature and the elements, reflecting a religion that feels both intimate and beautiful. Reading them, I was struck by a profound sense of peace and serenity.
“If it rains fire
you have to be as the water;
if it is a deluge of water you have to be as the wind;
if it is the Great Flood, you have to be as the sky;
and if it is the Very Last Flood of all the worlds,
you have to give up self
and become the Lord.”
Taken from A. K. Ramanujan’s translation and edition of Speaking of Śiva, first published in 1973