28 June

My Anniversary Gift: Kali-Ma, A Goddess I Love

by Jon Katz
Kali-Ma

Kali-Ma is one of the most popular Hindu goddesses in Kolkata, India, where Maria visited earlier this year.

She is the goddess of creation, preservation and destruction. She is perhaps the most complex of goddesses, feared by many for her bloodthirsty rampages (see the former lover’s heads, which hang around her neck.) She has many meanings.

She is the archetype of the birth-death spirit, the Gods intervened as she was devouring her consort’s entrails and she became a Mother and Protector figure. I admit I find her both admirable and disturbing and erotic, which says something about me, I suppose.

Kali-Ma is known as Mother-Kali in India, she is the shatterer of illusions, she represents to me the great dichotomy of all humanity, we are capable of such good, and such evil, both seem to reside in all of us. So many people are willing to hate, so many people are eager to do good, given the chance.

Even though Kali-Ma went on murderous rampages, she ended in a good place, she is protector of human beings, and this statue Maria bought me for our seventh wedding anniversary just arrived. I’m putting it on my desk next to my muse. Kali is seen alternately as the life-giver, preserver and destroyer.

She seems to embody the tortured schizophrenia of the human condition. I am happy to have her on my desk. She will inspire me and perhaps devour me if I don’t get to work on my book.

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