Muktinath
His hands the color of pitch he carries
Calloused beyond the dozen years he bears
Back and shoulders bent by forest’s weight
Carried each day to make a meal
Mother made frail by as many years of labor
Hair loosed now, brittle, a tangle of time
Beyond the scours of her life
She places faith, bright as copper,
In the boy borne of her blood and bone
For years they labored in tandem:
Four hands joined from dawn to dusk
Gathering wood for other fires
Only to return each night
To a stone cold hearth
They fostered in each other
The habit of huddling: one room house
Charcoal patina, itself a certain kind of womb
Each day they were reborn to labor.
A sky like stones the day she refused to rise
Child, I must burden you beyond your years
Go, go sparrow quick, and gather,
Lest we go hungry again this eve
And so the boy, feet bare but for leathered heels,
Raised his thatched barrel,
Strapped strange comfort to his forehead,
And headed out – out into what became
Brilliant morning; light poured from knotty pine
Recalling feathers and waterfalls
He walked with equal lightness
Even as the load he carried grew.
By midday, his was a tremendous thirst
This need for moisture greater than blighted soil
Bright pasture amidst wood nymph place
A refuge, mustn’t it be?Even flowers like stars
Colors as vivid as priest’s blessings,
Glittering like wedding garb
The boy bent down, loosed his forehead strap
Released from the weight of his subsistence
He blinked, then blinked again:
Rose white, for milk is just as sweet
A perfect pond of this blessed liquid
Appeared before his feet.
Imagine the smart: fear kneaded into courage
He drinks, then drinks again
Indeed this lake springs milky sweetness
Too good, he things, for this village boy
Thirst quenched, drunk on milk and rest,
He sinks into sleep beside the godly lake
He wakes, resolved
Mother, we will no longer bear
The burden of the forest as our own
Bring me a pail, a tin worthy of nectar,
And I will bear out your life with sweetness
To match the bitterness with which you bore mine
Mother, speechless, found her son a pail
And off he went to fetch his fortune
Simple though it was: milk, the stuff of birth and tea
This libation would quench more than thirst
Each morning the boy dipped his pail
Into blessed lake, returning heavy-handed
To the village, where people young and old
Grew to crave, to clamber for, each drop
If a child in poverty can rise to riches with a pail
So it was for him.
Soon, though, rumors echoed like crows
A caw which caught the king
Even old age could not soothe that memory of iron
Shackled, bound, the boy knelt before his master
A mortal power, for all the ways
Royalty postures like a god
What is this milk you bring, boy?
A long-nosed leader crooned. Rags betray you.
The cow from which you suckle wealth
Must be another’s prize
The boy bowed; tears streamed from glacial eyes,
The take of his good fortune pouring forth
I have stolen nothing, my master, but the
Self-arising sweetness of a lake
Come, see for yourself the richness of your land.
And so the boy restrained became a guide
And the king bowed down, humbled, small as sands
Before the earthbound cloud
With worship, earth brought fourth
Three glorious forms; these became his gods
King weathered and grew wise under their guard
And a harrowed mother’s pain
Lifted like fog with age
And the boy became a man
Elder king, calves bowed from lakeside rituals,
Eyes smile-lined, a ring of hair
Like the ridge where rock meets snow,
Arrived one day to honor well-worn idols
And found them gone
King grieved as if he’d lost both mother and child
Twenty-four hours could not suffice for searching
A boy’s thirst now betrayed by an old man’s grief
The king staggered, faltered with the loss
Regal blood thinned by futile quests
East of this once-strong kingdom, and higher,
Higher still, another valley bloomed
Summer fresh and flowing
Water like medicine, springs to cure souls
Two nuns – hands locked in friendship
More than prayer – stumbled on the statues
As they might have a stone
But these were no ordinary stones
Women religious peeled wonder from their sleeves,
Hitched up their robes and ran
Prostrate before you speak.
They summoned silence, greeted the lama,
Then spilled the news:
We have been visited, jeweled one,
By creatures proud and marvelous
We know not from whence they’ve come
But they have rooted to our plain
The lama rose, followed his disciples to this spot
It is peace and veneration they seek
Finding in the eyes of these divine apparitions
The tamed serpent, underworld naga,
Itself another sort of king
By and by the nuns worked mud into shelter,
Gave these idols a proper home
Time passed; news traveled west
When that other king arrived, red faced
In this ancient mountain abode
He smelled the sweetness of his faith
Before he looked upon
Long-lost emissaries of heaven and earth
At first anger scoured his majesty
Were these devoted hermits really thieves?
One word from the quiet lama’s lips
Quelled the tide of anger
In its place stood awe
How could they? But they could. Arrive here.
Not by chance but by a more-than-human will
This craving for moon and sky and wind
But the worldly king could not rest
With the thought of his protectors resting here
So far from the lush forests of his world
With lama’s blessing and a palanquin
Forged from what wood this land could spare
The king’s attendants foisted gods upon shoulders,
Made tracks down mountainside
Yet as the entourage made time, time slowed
The weight of these small statues
Redoubled with each step
Storm curdled sky; hail reigned triumphant
Upon the heads of men
Snow blanketed this land – forgetting summer –
As if warm wind were fantasy
The king, heady but learned, bowed again
To place and time
His fair gods belonged here now
The lama welcomed a party returned,
Defeat coloring the edges of a crystal sky
By sundown faraway king and nearby lama
Shared tea if not language,
And prayed together.
Many years hence, another kingly lineage
This time in feminine form
Drew upon her faith to figure pilgrimage,
Arrived breathless but content
To have reached such a blessed spot
By day the queen and her attendants
Spilled vermillion as if it were blood
Marigolds fancied wildflowers and dust
Demure, the queen blushed as she disrobed
Honeysuckle skin, singed under icy fire:
Water plunging from sacred source
By night, the queen dreamed of the Preserver
Great Vishnu, supine and sublime
And so it was that yet another royal decree
Brought kindred attention to this Buddhist place
And brought Vishnu here to rest.
Now that adamantine stream splits itself
One hundred and eight times,
Pours forth from mouths agape:
Bulls whose hearts are open to the world
To cleanse if not to sanctify
As for a name, this place of water eyes
Of sky dancers and eternal flame,
Became what it is today: a place of liberation
As for the hollow where the queen
Laid her head and dreamed
It is named for such a queen
Years unfurl – a ribbon of time
Yet the people of that other land,
Forest-bound and fertile,
A place of origins and war,
Arrive in this cup of highland earth
Bearing an inheritance of loss,
Spill milky tears upon these mountain stones,
And depart bathed in history,
Sweet but for its sting.
-August 2, 2012, Rani Phowa, Mustang.
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Sienna Craig is currently an assistant professor of anthropology at Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. Sienna has published widely in both academic and popular venues, including The Explorer’s Journal, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, Shambala Sun, Studies in Nepali History and Society, and European Bulletin of Himalayan Research. Her books/monographs include Healing Elements: Efficacy and the Social Ecologies of Tibetan Medicine(2012), Medicine Between Science and Religion: Explorations on Tibetan Grounds(2010), Studies of Medical Pluralism in Tibetan History and Society (2010), Horses Like Lightning: A Story of Passage through the Himalayas(2008). She is a recipient of various grants, awards, honors and fellowships. For more details please click here - Sienna Craig.
