Power Misused
Shiva and Parvati shared common interests. He was a good teacher and she, an excellent pupil. She was, in fact, a storehouse of much occult and mystic knowledge. Shiva had provided her the key to many esoteric rites, some of them double-edged. One day she was having as specially interesting session with him. She led him on till he had told her more than he had intended to. She listened with an inward smile and growing excitement she had decided to use some of her newly acquired powers on Shiva. As he entered his favourite meditating grove, Dharmarayana, he fell, losing total consciousness. When he revived she was repentant and decided to atone with penance.

The cosmos was a whole aeon old and its annihilation was due. Brahma and Vishnu came to Shiva with a gentle reminder. We are aspects of you, created to function when the kalpa takes its manifest course. The cycle is now complete and we want to merge, Lord. Draw us in, so that we may be one with merge, Lord. Draw us in, so that we may be one with you. The worlds wait to be reduced, before fresh renewal. The triad contracted and were absorbed, to await separation again when the new kalpa called for their participation -Brahma to create, Vishnu to preserve and Rudra to destroy.

Partners in Destruction
Shiva instructed Parvati: Shed you gentle self. Rise to the occasion, strike, burn, destroy, let loose your fires. Bless you. The Devi was reluctant- she was a mother, she nurtured. How could she destroy? For answer, he made a sound that lashed her like a whip into instant action. She grew to cove the quarters, dark and threatening and strode out, sniffing death like a jackal. Blood and gore spread thick, marrow and bone crackled crackled in flaming heaps. The sight, sounds and smells of death spurred her on as she quaffed blood from a skull garland of scorpions swaying, the sting of life and sting of life and death, sharp knots of pain tied fast with torture. Shiva breathed out a great wind, drying up the oceans. Storm winds blew and the universe spun like a shirling firebrand, fanning itself into tidal waves of flame. Soon, all was ash, great heaps of cosmic dust. Kali returned to Shiva who was waiting to receive her. Ecstatic, they danced, stamping out the past and stirring up the future, in step with Time.