Samskara 83

He lay bedridden. Even if someone tried to wake him, he had no awareness left. Garudacharya, seeking consolation, said it must be indigestion from overeating. Alas! The poor Brahmins lamented that he had never missed his ritual meal. Rising hurriedly, he washed his face, ate some curds and rice at Analakki’s house, and then, walking slowly for twenty miles, reached another agrahara by nightfall. That night he ate there, and by dawn, Padmanabhacharya was burning with fever and lay bedridden. Thinking it must be the fatigue of the journey, they left him there and, walking another ten miles, reached the matha as the drums sounded for the midday worship.

Chapter Five

Now, except for his fever-stricken, outcast wife lying in bed, and the vultures and crows that pecked at the corpse, Praneshacharya was the only one left in the agrahara, unseen by any living soul. The rituals—worship, purifications, and all sacred duties—had ceased, and a dreadful, echoing emptiness had descended. The stench, thick and suffocating, clung to his nostrils, while the vultures perched on every rooftop, refusing to let anyone forget Naranappa’s corpse. Entering the god’s room, Praneshacharya saw a rat circle the sanctum in the wrong direction and then collapse, lifeless. He scolded it, picked it up by the tail, and threw it to the vultures. When he came inside, the harsh cacophony of crows and vultures drove him back out. Unable to lift his eyes to the midday sun, he wandered about, muttering “hush, hush” in vain. Tormented by hunger, he tied a few ripe bananas in his dhoti, bathed, crossed the river, and sat beneath a tree to eat. Peace returned to him. He remembered Chandri, who had fed him fruit from her lap in the darkness.

Samskara

Then, had he touched her out of remorse?—he wondered. Perhaps it was only the form of remorse, of regret, that had carried him along all these days, that same dharma, and the lust he had tamed like a caged tiger—nothing more. The moment Chandri’s breast brushed against him, the tiger reared up, baring its teeth at his so-called dharma. He remembered what Narayanappa had said: “Let’s see who wins—you or I... Go, lie with the fish-scented one...” He had once told a story, that our actions always bring us the opposite of what we intend. When I read Shakuntala, he must have felt the same. Not because of Narayanappa, but because of my own obstinacy, my own karma, the life of this agrahara has been upended. Which young man might have gone to the river and embraced a field-girl? Who would have heard my description? Which girl among the field-workers could evoke the image of Shakuntala in one’s mind? For the first time, the Acharya’s imagination—never before attentive—drew in all the untouchable girls, stripped them bare, and gazed at them. Who? Who?—Belli? Yes, Belli. His body shivered at the thought of her earthen-colored breasts, which he had never before counted as anything. He was ashamed of his own imagination. Narayanappa had once joked: to preserve Brahminhood, one must read the Vedas and Puranas without understanding their meaning. In the midst of his own regret, his knowledge, there must have been a spark hidden, a spark not dulled by the ignorance of the other Brahmins. Now, the tiger he had tamed bares its teeth—

He feels drawn to go and softly caress Belli’s breasts. He thirsts for the experience. All these days, he had not truly lived: he had only done what was expected, recited the Gayatri as told, survived without experience. Experience is a shock. It comes unexpectedly, in darkness, in the wild, uninvited. To desire and to attain—that is the ultimate experience, he realized: what we do not see comes to us, pressing against our very life like breasts, entering us.

Samskara

Now, letting go feels like wisdom born of experience. If, just as I felt the touch of a woman, Narayanappa, in the darkness, had felt the unexpected touch of the Supreme—when rain falls gently, it seeps into the pressed earth, breaking open the crust and turning into a sprout; but if one resists, it dries up, hard and barren. Narayanappa, hardened by his stubbornness, now lies dead and decaying. Until I touched Chandri, I too remained hardened in my stubborn opposition to him...

Even if I renounce desire, why should not the Supreme, as naturally as desire clings to me, come and touch me? Where is Chandri now? Has she, to spare herself pain, gone and sat by the corpse? How will she bear that misfortune—I was troubled by the thought. He plunged into the river and swam. No, here, like this, he thought, I will keep swimming and never stop. He remembered the days of his boyhood, when he would slip away from his mother’s watchful eyes and run to the river. After so many years, how strange that my childhood longing should return so vividly, he wondered. He would swim secretly, then lie on the sand, drying himself before returning home. What happiness can compare to lying on warm sand after swimming in cool water? He did not feel like returning to the agrahara. He lay down on the sand by the bank. In the heat of noon, his body dried in an instant, his back began to burn. Suddenly, he sprang up.

Like a beast with its nose to the earth, he entered the forest where he had met Chandri. Even in broad daylight, the place was dim, the old darkness thick among the tangled bushes. He stopped, as if led by some inner prompting, at the very spot where his life had been overturned. The imprint of a body still lingered on the green grass. He sat down. Like a man dazed, he plucked blades of grass and sniffed them. For one who had come from the agrahara, reeking with its own stench, the scent of fresh earth clinging to the roots of grass was intoxicating. Like a hen scratching