On Marking The Rock-Cut Baidyanath Temple Of Deoghar Poem by Bijay Kant Dubey

How had been the hills
When the temple was not,
I just think about,
How had it been the architects and artisans at worn,
Cutting, hammering and shaping the temple,
How had it been the duration of time,
Who can but say it
If the things lie in hidden
Under the wrap of mythology?

There is none to say about their historiography,
The year of making and construction,
The engineering and skill applied in,
The sculptors and artisans at work,
Everything but buried deep
In the womb of history,
Archaeology and myth and mysticism.

Pulled in between faith and doubt,
Faith taking it back to the hoary days of yore
While doubt ascribing it to the sixteenth century,
Whatever be that I want not to debate it,
But the structure plain and pyramidal
With the jyotirlingam inside
And the inner top with a n eight-petalled lotus
Called Chandrachuda Mani.

Into the door leading to the sanctum sanctorum
Just a small door leads to
As the passage for coming and going
Of the worshippers and devotees,
The stonework stupendous,
But not so decorated as the South Indian temples,
The rock-cut pillars hinging the sideways,
The space, the verandah adjoining the temple
At the entrance of the main temple.

The jyotirlingam, the pillar of light in the midst of it all,
Cylindrical in form,
The thing of sadhna and meditation,
Take the rudraksha rosay and count it
In the complex
With the face-to-face Parvati temple
And that too similar to type and tenor.

At the crest of the temple, lies a golden pitcher,
A moonstone mounted on to from the inside,
Fitted and set into
And from which the droplets of water
Fall upon the jyotirlingam,
Whatever be the things
But the temple an architectural specimen
Of rock-cut temples.
.