Roberto Calasso: Ka

Vinatā fell silent. Garuḍa respected her silence for a long time. Then he said: “Mother, Mother, you still haven’t told me how you became a slave to your sister.” “We were looking at the white horse. The more it enchanted me, the greater the rancor I felt for my sister. I said: ‘Hey, One-Eye, can you see what color that horse is?’ Kadrū didn’t answer. The black bandage leaned forward. Then I said: ‘Want to bet? The one who gets the horse’s color right will be mistress of the other.’ The following morning, at dawn, we were together again, watching the sky. And once again the horse appeared against the background of sea and sky. I shouted: ‘It’s white.’ Silence. I repeated: ‘Kadrū, don’t you think it’s white?’ To this day I have never seen such a malignant look in her eye. Kadrū said: ‘It’s got a black tail.’ ‘We’ll go and see,’ I said, ‘and whichever of us is wrong will be the other’s slave.’ ‘So be it,’ Kadrū said.

“Then we split up. Later I learned that Kadrū had tried to corrupt her children. She had asked them to hang on to the horse’s tail, to make it look black. The Snakes refused. For the first time Kadrū showed her fury. She said: ‘You’ll all be exterminated…’ One day you’ll realize,” Vinatā went on in a quieter voice, “that nothing can be exterminated, because everything leaves a residue, and every residue is a beginning… But it’s too soon to be telling you any more… Just remember this for now: Kadrū’s curse was powerful. One far-off day it will happen: the Pāṇḍavas and the Kauravas will fight, almost to the point of extinction, their own and that of the peoples allied to them, so that a sacrifice of the Snakes may fail, so that people recognize that the Snakes cannot be exterminated. That will happen at the last possible moment… Kadrū is calamitous, her word is fatal.” Vinatā’s eyes were two slits. “But where was I? Now we had to get to the horse. We took flight, side by side. The creatures of the deep flashed their backs above the waters, surprised to see these two women in flight. We paid no attention. The only thing in the world that mattered to us was our game. When we reached the horse, I stroked its white rump. ‘As you see,’ I said to Kadrū. ‘Wait,’ said One-Eye. And she showed me a few black hairs her deft fingers had picked out from among all the white ones of the creature’s tail. For no apparent reason, they were wrapped around a pole. Some say that those hairs were Snakes, faithful to their mother. Or that there was only one black hair, the Snake Karkoṭaka. Others say that Uccaiḥśravas has black hairs mixed in with the white. It’s a dispute that will never be settled. ‘I’ve beaten you. The sea is my witness. Now you are my slave,’ said Kadrū. It was then that I sensed, in a sudden rending, what debt is, the debt of life, of any life. For five hundred years I would feel its weight.”

“I’ll go and win this soma , Mother,” said Garuḍa with his most solemn expression. “But first I must eat.” They were squatting down face-to-face. Garuḍa, a mountain of feathers; Vinatā, a minute, sinuous creature. “Go to the middle of the ocean,” said Vinatā. “There you’ll find the land of the Niṣādas. You can eat as many of them as you want. They don’t know the Vedas. But remember: Never kill a Brahmān. A Brahmān is fire, is a blade, is poison. Under no circumstances, even if seized by anger, must you hurt a Brahmān.” Garuḍa listened, ever more serious. “But what is a brahman, Mother?” he said. “How do I recognize one?” So far Garuḍa had seen nothing but black, coiled snakes and those two women who hated each other. He did not know what his father looked like. A brahman? What on earth can that be? wondered Garuḍa. “If you feel a firebrand in your throat,” said Vinatā “that’s a brahman. Or if you realize you’ve swallowed a hook.” Garuḍa stared straight at her and thought: “So you can’t tell a brahman until you’ve almost swallowed him.” But already he was stretching his wings, eager to be gobbling up the Niṣādas. Caught by surprise, the Niṣādas didn’t even see Garuḍa coming. Blinded by wind and dust, they were sucked by the thousands into a dark cavity that opened behind his beak. They plunged down there as if into a well. But one of them managed to hang on to that endless wall. With his other hand he held a young woman with snaky hair light by the waist, dangling in the void. Garuḍa, who was gazing ahead with his beak half open, just enough to swallow up swarms of Niṣādas, suddenly felt something burning in his throat. “That’s a brahman,” he thought. So he said: “Brahman, I don’t know you, but I don’t mean you any harm. Come out of my throat.” And from Garuḍa’s throat came a shrill, steady voice: “I’ll never come out unless I can bring this Niṣāda woman with me, she’s my bride.” “I’ve no objections,” said Garuḍa. Soon he saw them climbing onto his beak, taking care, fearful of getting hurt. Garuḍa was intrigued and thought: “Finally I’ll know what a brahman looks like.” He saw them sliding down his feathers. The brahman was thin, bony, dusty, his hair woven in a plait, his eyes sunken and vibrant. His long, determined fingers never let go of the wrist of the Niṣāda woman, whose beauty immediately reminded Garuḍa of his mother and his treacherous aunt Kadrū. This left him bewildered, while he rellected that quite probably he had already swallowed up thousands of women like her. But by now those two tiny beings were hurrying off, upright, agile, impatient, as if the whole world were opening before them. Garuḍa was more puzzled than ever. He felt an urgent need to talk to his father, whom he’d still not seen. As his wings stretched, another whirlwind devastated the earth.

Kaśyapa was watching a line of ants. He paid no attention to his son, nor to the crashing that announced his arrival. But Garuḍa wasn’t eager to speak either. He was watching Kaśyapa, his wrinkled, polished skull, his noble arms hanging down in abandon. He studied him for a while. He thought: “Now I know what a brahman is. A brahman is one who feeds himself by feeding on himself.” After a day’s silence, Kaśyapa looked up at Garuḍa. He said: “How is your mother?” then immediately went on to something else, as if he already knew the answer. “Seek out the elephant and the turtle who are quarreling in a lake. They will be your food. The Niṣādas aren’t enough for you. Then go and eat them on Rauhiṇa, that’s a tree near here, a friend of mine. But be careful not to offend the Vālakhilyas…”

“Who can these Vālakhilyas be?” thought Garuḍa, flying along, the elephant and the turtle tight in his claws. “No sooner does one thing seem to get clearer than another, bigger thing turns up that’s completely obscure.” While Garuḍa was thinking this over, puzzled again, his wing skimmed the huge tree Rauhiṇa. “By all means rest on a branch and eat,” said the tree’s voice. “Before you were born you sat here on me, along with a companion of yours, exactly like yourself. Perched on opposite branches, at the same height, you never left each other. You were already eating my fruit back then. And your companion watched you, though he didn’t eat. You couldn’t fly about the world then, because I was the world.” Garuḍa settled on a branch. Surrounded by the foliage that enfolded his feathers, he felt at home and couldn’t understand why. Of his birthplace he could remember only sand, stone, and snakes. Whereas this tree protected him on every side with swathes of emerald that softened the merciless light of the sky. Hmm… In the meantime he might as well devour the elephant and the turtle, now on their backs on this branch that was a hundred leagues long. He concentrated a moment. He was choosing the spot where he would sink his beak — when there came a sudden crash. The branch had snapped. Shame and guilt overcame Garuḍa. He knew at once that he had done something awful, without having meant to. And it was all the more awful because he had not meant it. A vortex opened up in the tree, and Garuḍa flew out with the broken branch in his beak, the elephant and the turtle still in his claws. He was lost. He didn’t know where to go. He sensed he was in danger of making a fatal mistake. From the branch came a hiss. At first he thought it was the wind. But the hissing went on, peremptory and fearfully shrill. He looked at the twigs. Upside down among the leaves, like bats, dangled scores of brahmans, each no taller than the phalanx of a thumb. Their bodies were perfectly formed and almost transparent, like flies’ wings. Used as they were to hanging motionless, the flight was upsetting them terribly. Garuḍa thought: “Oh, the Vālakhilyas…” He was sure it was they, sure of the enormity of his crime. “Noble Vālakhilyas,” said Garuḍa, “the last thing I want is to hurt you.” He was answered by a mocking rustle. “That’s what you all say…” Now he made out a voice. “The indestructible is tiny and tenuous as a syllable. You should know that, being made of syllables yourself. The tiny is negligible. So it is neglected…” “Not by me,” said Garuḍa. And now he began to fly in the most awkward fashion, taking the greatest possible care not to shake the branch he held in his beak. Despondent, he studied the mountains, looking for a clearing large and soft enough for him to put down the Vālakhilyas. But he couldn’t find one. Perhaps he would waste away in the sky, circling forever. It was then that a huge mountain, the Gandhamādana, began to take shape ahead, and Garuḍa thought that he might attempt a last exploration. He was flying around the summit, slowly and cautiously, when he recognized the polished head of his father, Kaśyapa, sitting by a pond on the slopes of the Gandhamādana. Garuḍa hovered over him, without making a sound. Kaśyapa said nothing, paid no attention, though the whole of Gandhamādana was veiled in shadow. Then he said: “Child, don’t be distressed, and don’t do anything rash that you might regret. The Vālakhilyas drink the sun, they could burn your fire…” Garuḍa was still hovering above his father, terrified. Then he heard Kaśyapa’s voice change. He was speaking to the Vālakhilyas, on familiar terms, whispering. “Garuḍa is about to perform a great deed. Take your leave of him now, I beg you, if you still think well of me…” A little later, Garuḍa saw the Vālakhilyas detaching themselves from the branch, like tiny, dry leaves, gray and dustly. They turned slowly in the air and slowly settled next to Kaśyapa. Soon they had disappeared among the blades of grass, heading toward the Himālaya.