ଶ୍ରୀ ଦକ୍ଷିଣାସ୍ଯ ନକ୍ଷତ୍ରମାଲା ସ୍ତୋତ୍ରମ୍

A garland of constellations — twenty-seven verses for the twenty-seven stars, with the closing verses that such a garland takes — every one of them ending on the line I picture Dakshinamurti in my heart. The first sets the moon's crescent shining in his hair and calls him one who has taken a vow of initiation into the giving of knowledge, worshipped by Lakshmi's lord and by the lotus-born and the rest. The second has him carrying off the remorse of those who have bowed, his lotus feet praised by the horse-faced and the elephant-faced, and held in the mind by the foremost of sages. The form is a counting device as much as a hymn: the reciter tells the verses off against the stars, and the colophon names the Sringeri Jagadguru who composed it.