Kalpa refers to the measure of an eon in Hindu and Buddhist literature. A Kalpa could be described as the amount of time it takes for a mile-high iron mountain to be worn down to the earth by a deva (heavenly being) descending from heaven every one hundred years and brushing this mountain with a silk scarf. Alternately, Zen priests have said, “with an inhalation I make the universe, with an exhalation, I destroy it.”
Kalpa is made of a series of iridescently grained redwood planks, sitting on short lengths of yellow canarywood. Upon these planks are a series of bones: human bones dipped in paint and flocked with a deep blood colored flocking and bleached coyote bones. The bones are tied together with a length of aircraft cable. All bones are arranged to ascend or descend in order of size, irregardless of species. Kalpa represents the passage of time, marked out, like beads of a rosary; each moment, unique yet linked by the structure of life. As one passes through time, these moments shrink in size and increase in number, like peering down a deep, long, circuitous hallway, or, ever expand and extend into gradually longer periods, until
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one is left with eternity itself. Both rules of order meet the rich metaphor of time in these eastern traditions.