here is the transliterated sanskrit alphabet (to latin script):
it acts as a "table" for the letters to stand in, with vowels (a, i, u, e, o and semivowels y,r,l,v) at the bottom and consonants at the top (which by columns, स्थान (stana) — places of articulation, from left to right are ordered to be as going from the back of the mouth to the tip of the lips, with the square box marking the possibility of महाप्राण mahaapraana [added exhalation] . so it's following anatomical order instead of "a,b,c,d...". The Devanagari alphabet is known as the garland of colors, where a horizontal top line called सूत्र (sutra) — meaning thread, symbolising the mind — is present in every letter, which would each be a colorful flower; similarly the H here stands for the breathspan (in the shape of a mathematical segment, a line with two ends, to indicate the stoppings of breath कुम्भक (kumbhaka) and शून्यक (shunyaka)), after all, it is presenting or measuring the exhaling that carries all sounds. in this way the table is also the breath; and it presents or measures the exhalation which brings all the sounds of speech with it.
it is there as an aesthetic element and also because in sanskrit the metric length of vowels, as short लघु (laghu) and long गुरु (guru) sounds, (similarly to how latin mora works), can get combined to fit into a specific poetic metering, so if you go seeing for each consequent meter length of poetic verse, how many combinations of short and long sound are possible, the pingala succesion arises. — known in the west as Fibonacci — and otherwise known also as maatra meru (mountain of metric) (https://youtu.be/siFBqH-LaQQ explained by a mathematician). also spiral in sanskrit is सर्पिल (sarpila), the same word means serpent
you can see the ॐ (aum̐) mantra moves through that spiral — from the bottom-up — for the A resonates in the navel, U in the chest, M in the neck. from open mouth to closed, has all sounds of speech.
from the spiral top-down would read as "shambhavaa" in which sham means twilight or junction and bhava means emotion, in sanskrit
also, what do you think of this relationship, about the length of speech and the elements:
laghu (short sound) - earth (annamayakosha),
guru (long) - water (manomayakosha),
pluta (longer) - fire (pranamayakosha),
swara (sustained, mental) - air (vijnanamayakosha),
and raga (melodious, varied) - akash (anandamayakosha)
and lastly,
what about the squiggly shapes?
what do you think devanagari squiggles stand for?(it could be like snakes crawling and mingling simbolically?)
since korean (hangul script) shows the tongue placement for each sound (and even this diagram of latin script kinda does too if you look in certain characters like
K (tongue and palate meeting at the back of mouth),
B with two lips that are used to sound it,
T with the tongue reaching for the roof of the mouth,
O with the rounded lips,...
maybe devanagari shows where in the body each letter resonates?
and lastliest,
I heard someone say that in the womb, life enters the body through the ब्रह्मरन्ध्र brahmarandra, the soft spot at the top of the head of a baby where the skull is not yet formed, and that it also exits through there at the end of a life, so, saying "Shambhavaa" (indicating the sound going downwards through the spiral) <or simpler, the sound "maa", without the sibilant (sha), mahapraana (bha) and vowel (va/ua)> to simbolise the life entering in the body, from silence to sound, and then saying aum̐, to present the same praana as exiting the body by it going upwards in the resonation through the body;
other ways to present these sounds together are:
shambhavām̐ (shambhavaa+aum)
and then if you map these two in the right and left side (as this graph shows the right hand) it can be further simbolised by अनुलोम विलोम (anuloma viloma): inhale through left nostril, exhale through right. in hatha yoga the left half of the body is lunar and the right is solar.
or what if one says aloud shambhavā (downwards motion) and simultaneously mentally reciting aum̐ (upwards motion); are these motions the naturally present qualities of each both body and mind?
or maybe this too can be expressed in the duality of question and answer. "shambhavā? aum̐."
or if one mentally recites shambhavaa while inhaling and loudly say aum while exhale.
maybe its beautiful to join the hands together in namaste after seeing these ideas :)
also there is a rule in the grammar that states that whenever the Ha sound comes before a nasal sound it should be uttered after it instead, the aim of this is to produce a chest originating sound that relaxes the speech (Ahh sound, like a sigh of relief) , instead of a neck constricting one. so this way, together with exhaled sounds (mahapraana) the whole of the speech is relaxed always!
sanskrit in sanskrit means balanced craft or artificial construction
the next image represents लिङ्ग चन्द्र बिन्दु (linga chandra and bindu)
Linga means mark or form in sanskrit grammar and is simbolically associated with the male seed and ashes, hence white in color, and also with the right side of the body in hatha yoga, the solar half. here can represent a letter or glyph.
next is chandra, the crescent moon colored black, it simbolises the femenine lunar cycle and along with the red of the triangle, fire of the funerary pyre! its associated with the lunar left side of the body here it can simbolise the breath. Along with the bindu it denotes a nasal sound in grammar. (as seen in om̐)
the red triangle around, red in color (as fire) can represent the "clear light of the void" which is appearent and transparent as seen in the bindu, which can simbolise the womb and its yoga as a doorway into the world.
simbolically, the crescent moon can be as a metal bowl, the bottom linga can be the mallet that rubs againts the rim of it and the bindu the ringing sound it produces.
In sanskrit all letters are bound by a horizontal line on top called as sutra (meaning thread) and usually simbolises the mind. this can be pictured as going vertically here; and it passing through the hole, which is the stringing of the mundamala, since you can picture the three shapes together as a human figure with arms raised, and the bindu being the head
The idea is that in the moment of conception death begins. hence the triangle can be related with the skull, the linga with the tongue, the chandra with the mind, the bindu with the sound/mantra, and the sutra with the infinitude of meaning of that sound.
having said this, dialectically the consonant sounds, percusive as they are, are symbolised with a little drum (damaru) that god shiva plays. another way to see it is, like the maihar tradition, with the rudra vīna (a string instrument): to play it the right hand (pingala nadi) plucks strings to produce a buzzing sound which can be related with vowels and the left hand (ida nadi) ornaments it with pitch variations which can be compared to how the tongue modulates the sound to make consonants. without the right hand plucking there is no possibility for melody on the left hand. these can be linked to kriya (action) and gnana (knowledge) respectively, and their coming together (sangha) in a song, be linked with iccha (desire, will). in this way, as abhinavagupta said, the 16 vowels of the Sanskrit alphabet are referred to as “bija” (“seed”), while the 33 consonants can be called “yoni” ("womb").
the sound of the rudra vīna can be thought as hata nāda(struck sound), and the voice, is anahata nāda (unstruck sound)
"what is between swara(vowel) and vyanjana(consontant)?"
swara and vyanjana being the pingala and ida nadis as per how the vīna is played. i thought that sushumna cant be fathomed without these. now i dont know if it would be accurate to call each as kriya and gnana, and sushumna as iccha, but its an idea. and even if they work together by sangha (or sanghatta, rubbing on each other) can iccha be expressed at all? because all expression is using vowels and consonants, so iccha would be beyond expression? or sushumna is inclusive of these two?
by placing your right hand on the chest horizontally it aligns with the body halves: the fingers (where vyanjanas are according to the hand image) are feeling the heartbeat, and the palm, with the swaras, is placed on the pingala nadi. in this way you could say the hand acts as a microcosm of the body halves. now this makes one question what about the left hand then? it can be dancing as shakti does.
and just for fun we can relate these four (two hands and two halves of body) with the four movements of the breath like this: inhale as the left hand dancing, kumbhaka as the ida nadi (shakti), exhale as the right hand over the chest and shunyaka as the pingala nadi (shiva). using the ham-sa mantra, ham- can be a question and -sa an answer.
its fun to see how the interrogation sign resemble's a dripping khadga. by asking a question one sharpens the intellect.
further, if you put the left hand (vertically) in front of the right one (on chest), it can be read as a relation between shiva as ida and pingala and shakti as sushumna
also here is some art with similar ideas:
click here to see more art