One
sleepy summer afternoon, while helping
myself to a glass of chilled water, I saw
a
snake lying curled under the fridge. It
could
have been a very poisonous cobra. Very
quickly, I chose my mode
of attack: Acid.
Staggering, I reached for the glass bottle
so that I could pour the yellow-green cheap
acid on its slimy body, burning it to death.
Stop it, the
snake hissed in pure Tamil
connecting with me in the language of
my prayer and poetry. I am an exile.
And I configured mental images of political
refugees. It wriggled out
and I saw that
it was balding, almost Rushdie-like, perhaps
with a death sentence too. Controversy was
a
crowd pulling catch-phrase, to which I dutifully
succumbed. Acid bottle in
hand, I heard the
snake preach to me about living in detachment.
The perfection of life is when you
do not
know the difference between yielding and
resisting. The scrawny
being writhed further
and told me of rebirth and reincarnation.
Being
a writer I really wanted to take notes.
Instead
I began arguing. Shut up, the
snake said to me,
Karma and the whole
stuff that follows it is just
bunkum. You, a crazed agnostic, disagree
because
of borrowed ideas. Sharp movements
of the red
tongue terrified me. Almost sensing my fear,
it
said, You could never
challenge what you do
not comprehend. The snake spoke in
circles, in
patterns that could only resemble a snake
swallowing its tail. Whatever. And then
it
occurred to me: Speech was
the oldest trap,
the charming deceiver, persuasions
weapon
and Satans first area of expertise.
Stop it,
this time I said the words. Tell me
just your
story. Save the cant and
rant for critical times.
My acidic tone gained me a menacing status
and I continued, You are a mean serpent.
Instigator. Trouble-maker. Sly liar. Undulating
temptation-provider. Unworthy
reminder
of the seduction of strength over matter.
It
protested in a booming resonant voice, No,
I
am not any of this. I am just an exile,
from
paradise. Because of your
Catholic upbringing,
you dont even know about the paradise
lost
in Hinduism. Who bothered for history
or
heritage, except shriveling snakes and failed
writers? At least, we both
had something in
common. Look here comrade, my credentials
are different. In heaven, I was an activist.
An
avid dissenter. Before the accession to
heaven,
long long ago, I was a mighty
monarch on earth,
feared and respected. I was Nahusa the Great.
My subjects were happy, the kingdom prosperous.
And I ruled for twelve thousand years, until
the day
when I decided that I could
take leave of life. In
heaven too, I was venerated. But one question
had
plagued me all the years of my long life,
and it still
tormented me in heaven. I wanted to know
why
caste was there, why people
suffered because of
their karmas. I questioned the Gods, and
the learned
sages there. I asked them what would happen
if an
high-born did manual work just like the
low-born.
I worried about the division
of labor, this disparity
in dreams and destinies. You could say I
was a rebel
pleading for liberty-equality-fraternity.
I had a riotous
history of revolution. The Gods plotted
against me,
decided that I was trouble.
I was cursed to turn into
a vile snake. I was banished from paradise.
For sixty
million years, I shall roam the earth, and
then I may
return. This was a different case
of the paradise lost.
In this tale, there was no
forbidden fruit, no second
fickle-minded woman. Tradition triumphed
over reason
and the good were cast away. I let the serpent
go,
happy that he had given my hungry mind a
story, or
perhaps, a poem to be written
on unfair days. I began
to respect snakes the challengers
of hierarchy.
While I gave him the freedom of safe passage
I vowed never to kill serpents. Much later
I realized brutally that
this was just another
occupational hazard for choosing a life
where I was to be showing solidarity
with activists and dissenters.
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