Chapter Thirty-Three
All my desire burning for a bandit’s love—
if I see him I will wrench from their roots these useless breasts
fling them at Govardhana’s chest, put an end to this raging fire
Nacciyar Tirumoli 13:8
We walked from the railway station to town, Vasur’s bare feet silent on the bitumen, the flip-flopping of my thongs. My thoughts wound like weft round a shuttle, looking for a way in. But what was there to say? A peacock’s insistent calling cut through the night. The temple’s floodlit gopuram beamed bright as a lighthouse above the dark shadows of mango trees. Scents of hay and cow and fermenting fruit layered the air.
‘It is all a divine play,’ Vasur had said, somewhere between Rajapalayam and Srivilliputtur, ‘between the three qualities binding spirit to each human bo
