Holly Tsun Haggarty
Kundalini in Wartime
The guru says,
“Place your left hand on your belly, an inch above the navel;
go inward;
find your centre of energy, your shakra of self.”
I do. I see.
Eyes shut. I feel.
That cord pulsing with the ichor of life.
My connection to Mother.
I am you are I.
“Raise your right hand to shoulder height, palm forward--
abhaya mudra.”
Like a stop sign, a barrier, this gesture of protection.
Like the thick walls of womb.
Despite which, I was thrust out at the moment of birth.
Cut off.
Cord lost.
Independence begun.
(The sovereign self at odds with its state.)
I forgot the pregnant plenitude.
I query the mystery of lack.
“Breathe in; close the pelvic door;
seal the leaks; suspend your breath.”
Regard the umbilicus of my ethereal self.
A blue cross in a green circle
extends to a chromosomal cross-over.
Lines of cobalt energy radiate outward
to shining expectation.
“Imagine a canvas on which you draw a circle--
your energy centre--
follow where it leads you.”
From the nuclear core, concentric ovoids pulse outward.
Reach to encompass me.
I think this a labyrinth--
or maybe just want to think--
trying to trace passage to the centre--
I find myself blocked, walled in.
I look for doors.
Finding none, I draw them in.
Jump, room to room, level to level, down, down.
But the closer I get to centre, the more perilous it feels.
Like Minos’ maze.
Or Chakravyuha.
The centre of the battlefield, a missile ready to be unleashed.
“What does it sound like?
What does it taste like?
What colours do you see?”
Blue and yellow blending to greens.
A tank of algae-coloured water.
Do I dare drink?
Whiff of petroleum distillates.
The tensile strength of compressed air rising in pitch.
“Exhale, express yourself;
speak your thoughts till the end of breath.”
Words escape, like a baptismal deluge.
So many prayers spill out, the text becomes palimpsest.
Curlicues of thick yellow oil.
Curving corridors of this maze, my confessionals.
Ragged breath slows to mucous sniffs.
“If you turn your canvas around,
what might others see?”
A mollusk, cockle still alive, underbelly quivering like jelly.
Four-chambered heart fibrillates, sparks
to nervous nodes. Frozen by day,
slithering fearfully into the moist, sticky dark.
Sinuous bright-fall of shells.
(Kundalini is a Sanskrit word used to describe a yoga practice engaged for releasing dormant spiritual power to
bodily energy centres (chakras) through efforts such as chanting, breathing patterns, gestures (mudras) and poses.)
“Place your left hand on your belly, an inch above the navel;
go inward;
find your centre of energy, your shakra of self.”
I do. I see.
Eyes shut. I feel.
That cord pulsing with the ichor of life.
My connection to Mother.
I am you are I.
“Raise your right hand to shoulder height, palm forward--
abhaya mudra.”
Like a stop sign, a barrier, this gesture of protection.
Like the thick walls of womb.
Despite which, I was thrust out at the moment of birth.
Cut off.
Cord lost.
Independence begun.
(The sovereign self at odds with its state.)
I forgot the pregnant plenitude.
I query the mystery of lack.
“Breathe in; close the pelvic door;
seal the leaks; suspend your breath.”
Regard the umbilicus of my ethereal self.
A blue cross in a green circle
extends to a chromosomal cross-over.
Lines of cobalt energy radiate outward
to shining expectation.
“Imagine a canvas on which you draw a circle--
your energy centre--
follow where it leads you.”
From the nuclear core, concentric ovoids pulse outward.
Reach to encompass me.
I think this a labyrinth--
or maybe just want to think--
trying to trace passage to the centre--
I find myself blocked, walled in.
I look for doors.
Finding none, I draw them in.
Jump, room to room, level to level, down, down.
But the closer I get to centre, the more perilous it feels.
Like Minos’ maze.
Or Chakravyuha.
The centre of the battlefield, a missile ready to be unleashed.
“What does it sound like?
What does it taste like?
What colours do you see?”
Blue and yellow blending to greens.
A tank of algae-coloured water.
Do I dare drink?
Whiff of petroleum distillates.
The tensile strength of compressed air rising in pitch.
“Exhale, express yourself;
speak your thoughts till the end of breath.”
Words escape, like a baptismal deluge.
So many prayers spill out, the text becomes palimpsest.
Curlicues of thick yellow oil.
Curving corridors of this maze, my confessionals.
Ragged breath slows to mucous sniffs.
“If you turn your canvas around,
what might others see?”
A mollusk, cockle still alive, underbelly quivering like jelly.
Four-chambered heart fibrillates, sparks
to nervous nodes. Frozen by day,
slithering fearfully into the moist, sticky dark.
Sinuous bright-fall of shells.
(Kundalini is a Sanskrit word used to describe a yoga practice engaged for releasing dormant spiritual power to
bodily energy centres (chakras) through efforts such as chanting, breathing patterns, gestures (mudras) and poses.)
Artist Statement
On February 24, 2022, a revanchist Russia invaded its neighbour Ukraine. A year later, UN Secretary General António Guterres warns: “I fear the world is not sleepwalking into a wider war [but] doing so with its eyes wide open.” How can one not gape as war crimes and civilian attacks intensify? How can one not gape in fear of another world catastrophe? In this arts-integrating inquiry, I respond to what I learn of this war, as well as what I learn, from this war, of bellicosity in self, other and world.
Holly Tsun Haggarty
Holly Tsun Haggarty, metaphysician, was awarded her doctorate in 2021 from Lakehead University. She engages multiple art media and wisdom traditions to engage philosophical questions such as: How is art a way of knowing? How does belief affect methods of knowing? How might/should a curriculum respond to sacred mysteries?