My submission at your lotus feet—

We have been married for fifteen years, but to this day I have never written you a letter. I have always been at hand—you have heard so many words from my lips, and I too have listened to you-but there has never been an interval in which a letter might have been written.

Today I have come on pilgrimage to the seat of Lord Jagannath in Puri, while you remain tied to your work in office. Your bond with Calcutta is like that of a snail with its shell; the city has grown into your body and soul. That is why you did not apply for leave from the office. Such was the wish of the Almighty; he granted my application for leave.

I am the second daughter-in-law of your father's house. Today, after fifteen years, standing by the ocean's shore, I have learnt that I have a different relation as well with the world and the Lord of the world. That is why I have taken courage to write this letter; it is not a letter from the second daughter-in-law of your family.

In infancy—when no one but God, who had fated my relation with your family, knew of its possibility—my brother and I were struck down together by typhoid. My brother died; I survived. The women of the neighborhood began to say, "Mrinal lived because she's a girl; if shed been a boy would she have been spared?" The god of death is skilled in the art of theft; he covets what is precious.

Death will not come for me. It is to explain this properly that I have sat down to write this letter.

When a distant uncle of yours came with your friend Nirad to our house to inspect the prospective bride, I was twelve years old. We lived in an inaccessible village, where you could hear the jackals howl by day. To reach it you had to take a carriage from the railway station for fourteen miles, and cover the last three miles of dirt road in a palanquin. How sorely were they harassed that day! And on top of that, our East Bengal cooking-your uncle has still not forgotten the farce of that meal.

Your mother was determined that her second daughter-in-law's looks should make good the elder one's deficiency in beauty. Otherwise why should you take so much trouble to visit our village? In Bengal, no one has to hunt out diseases of the spleen, the liver, or the stomach, nor need you search for a bride; they come and fasten on you themselves, they will not let you go.

My father's heart began to quake, my mother called on the goddess Durga. How was a rustic worshipper to appease the gods of the city? Their hope lay solely in the beauty of their daughter. But their daughter took no pride in that beauty—it was priced at whatever the buyer of-fered. It is for this reason that women never lose their diffidence, whatever their beauty or virtues.

The anxiety of the entire household, indeed of the entire neigh-borhood, lay on my heart like a stone. That day it seemed as though all the light in the sky and all the powers of the universe were joint bailiffs firmly holding up a twelve-year-old country girl for the scrutiny of her two examiners' two pairs of eyes. I had nowhere to hide.

The whole sky wept to the strains of flute-music as I entered your house. Even after a minute scrutiny of my imperfections, the crowd of housewives acknowledged that on the whole I was indeed beautiful. This verdict made my elder sister-in-law grave. But I wonder what use my beauty was! If some ancient pedant had created beauty out of holy Ganga silt, then you would have valued it; but as it is, it was created by God for His own pleasure, and so it has no value in your righteous household.

It did not take long for you to forget that I had beauty-but you were forced to remember at each step that I had brains. This intelligence is so much a part of my nature that it has survived even fifteen years in your household. My mother feared for this cleverness of mine; for a woman it was an impediment. If one who must follow the limits laid down by rule seeks to follow her intelligence, she will stumble repeatedly and come to grief. But what was I to do? God had carelessly given me much more intelligence than I needed to be a wife in your household; to whom was I now to return it? Your family have abused me daily as an over-clever female. Harsh words are the consolation of the weak-so I forgive them.

I had one possession beyond your household, which none of you knew about. I used to write poems in secret. Whatever rubbish they were, the walls of your women's quarrels had not grown round them. In them lay my freedom-I was myself in them. You and your family never liked, never even recognized, whatever in me exceeded the "second daughter-in-law" of your household. In fifteen years, you never discovered that I am a poet.

The most vivid of my first memories of your house is of the cattle-shed. The cattle were housed in a shed just next to the stairs leading to the women's quarters; they had no room to move in except for the courtyard in front. In a corner of that courtyard stood the wooden trough for their fodder. The servant had much to do in the mornings; meanwhile the starving cows would lick and chew the sides of the trough to a pulp. My heart wept for them. I was a country girl—when I first entered your house, those two cows and three calves seemed to me as my only familiar relatives in the whole city. When I was a new bride, I would feed them secretly out of my own food. When I grew up, my evident fondness for the cows led those of my in-laws on jesting terms with me to express doubts about my lineage.

My daughter died almost immediately after she was born. She called to me, too, to go with her. If she had lived, she would have brought to my life whatever is great and true: from being the second daughter-in-law, I would then have become a mother. A mother, even within the confines of her own family, belongs to the family of the world. I suffered only the pain of motherhood; I never experienced its freedom.

I remember that the English doctor was astonished at the sight of our women's quarters, and scolded us angrily about the state of the lying-in room. There is a garden to the front of your house; your outer rooms lack nothing by way of furniture and ornaments. The inner rooms are like the reverse of a piece of work in wool; they have neither decorum, nor grace, nor ornament. There lights burn dimly; the air enters by stealth, like a thief; the courtyard is immovably choked with rubbish; the stains on the walls and floors reign undisturbed. But the doctor made a mistake: he thought that this caused us constant suffering. In fact the reverse was true. Neglect is like the ashes which cover a fire: perhaps keeping it alive, but preventing its heat from being outwardly felt. When self-respect dwindles, neglect does not seem unjust; for this reason, it causes no suffering. That is also why women are ashamed to feel pain. I say, therefore, if it is your decree that women must suffer, then it is best to keep them in as neglected a state as possible; in comfort, the pain of suffering becomes greater.

Whatever the condition in which you kept me, it never occurred to me that there was any suffering involved. In the lying-in room, death came and stood at my head, yet I felt no fear at all. What is life to us, that we should fear death? Death is unwelcome only to those whose hold on life has been strengthened by love and care. If death, that day, had pulled me by the hand, I would have come away roots and all, like a clump of grass from loose earth. A Bengali woman speaks of dying in every second utterance. But where is the glory in such death? I am ashamed to die, so easy is death for the likes of me.

My daughter was like the evening star, appearing briefly only to fade away. I became occupied again with my daily chores and the cows and their calves. Life would have rolled on in this way to the very end, and there would have been no need, today, to write you this letter. But a tiny seed is blown by the wind to take root as a peepal shoot in a mortared house; in the end its ribs of brick and timber are cracked apart by that tiny seed. From somewhere a little speck of life blew into the firmly mortared arrangements of my household existence, and from that day the cracks began to appear.

After the death of their widowed mother, my elder sister-in-law's young sister Bindu was driven by her cousins' ill-treatment to seek refuge in her elder sister's house. All of you thought: what a nuisance! So vexatious is my nature that there was no helping it, the moment I saw all of you growing irritated and angry, my whole heart ranged itself to do battle by the side of the helpless girl. To have to take shelter with strangers against their wishes—how immense a humiliation! Is it possible to push aside one who has been forced to submit even to this?

I then became aware of my sister-in-law's situation. The claim of affection alone had prompted her to give shelter to her sister. But when she realized her husband's unwillingness, she began to pretend that the whole matter was a great nuisance—that she would do anything to be rid of this burden. She lacked the courage to show her love openly, from the heart, to her orphaned sister. She is an obedient wife.

Her dilemma grieved me still further. I saw that she made a point of demonstrating to everyone the coarseness of the clothes and food she provided for Bindu, as well as the fact that Bindu was put to work at the most menial of household chores. At this I felt not only pain but shame. My sister-in-law was anxious to prove to everyone that our household, by some fluke, had secured Bindu at a bargain price. She yielded much labor but cost very little.

My elder sister-in-law's family had little to boast of beyond its lineage: they possessed neither wealth nor good looks. You know how they pleaded with and importuned your father to agree to the marriage. My sister-in-law had always thought of her marriage as a great offence to your family. For this reason she tried, in every way, so to restrict herself as to take up very little space in your house.

But her wise example makes life difficult for us women. It is impossible for me to so limit myself in every point. When I decide that something is right, it is not my nature to be persuaded for someone else's sake that it is wrong. You too have had many proofs of this.

I drew Bindu to my rooms. Sister-in-law said: "Meja Bou is simply spoiling a poor man's daughter." She went around complaining to everyone as though I had brought about some terrible disaster. But I know that in her heart, she was relieved. Now the burden of blame would fall on me alone. Her heart was at peace in the knowledge that I was providing her sister with the love she herself could not show her.

My sister-in-law had tried to strike a few years off her sister's age. But it would not have been wrong to say, if only in secret, that she was no younger than fourteen. You know that the girl was so ill-favored that if she fell and hurt her head, people would be worried that the floor had suffered some damage. As a result, in the absence of her parents, there was no one to arrange a marriage for her, and who would be so hardy as to want to marry such a girl?

Bindu came to me in great trepidation of heart, as if she thought that I would not survive the contagion of her touch: as though there was no need for her to have been born at all in this world, as though she must pass by unobtrusively, avoiding people's eyes. In her father's house, her cousins had been unwilling to give up to her even a corner where some unwanted thing might lie forgotten. Inessential rubbish can easily find a place around our houses, because people forget it, but an inessential girl is in the first place unwanted, and moreover impossible to overlook; hence she does not find a place even in the rubbish-heap. One cannot say that Bindus cousins are utterly necessary to this world either; but they do well enough.

So when I called Bindu to my rooms, there was a trembling in her heart. Her fear filled me with sadness. I conveyed to her in many loving ways that there was a little place for her in my household.

But my household, after all, was not mine alone, and so my task was not easy. After a few days with me she developed a red rash on her skin: perhaps a heat rash, perhaps something else. All of you said it was smallpox-because it was Bindu. An inexperienced doctor from the neighborhood came and said that he could not tell what it was until a day or two had passed. But who was prepared to wait that day or two? Bindu herself was ready to die of shame at her illness. I said, "Never mind if she has smallpox, I'll stay with her in the lying-in room. No one else need be troubled." When all of you were in a fury at me over this, and even Bindus sister was putting on a show of extreme irritation and proposing to send the poor girl to hospital, suddenly the rash disappeared completely. At this you became even more concerned. You said that undoubtedly the smallpox had settled deep into her. For she was Bindu.

One great virtue of being reared in neglect is that one's constitution becomes virtually indestructible. Ailments refuse to visit you—the highways to death are wholly shut off. So illness mocked at Bindu and passed on—nothing happened to her. But it grew abundantly clear that the most insignificant person in the world was the one that was hardest to give shelter to. One who has most need of shelter finds the greatest obstacles to it.

When Bindu lost her fear of me, she tied herself in yet another knot. She developed so great a love for me that it made me afraid. I had never seen such an image of love in my household. I had read of such love in books, but that was love between men and women. For a long time, there had been no occasion for me to recall that I was beautiful— now, after so many years, this ugly girl became obsessed with my beauty. It was as if her eyes could never have enough of gazing on my face. She would say, "Didi, no one but me has ever seen this face of yours." On the days when I braided my hair myself, she would be hurt and offended. She loved to handle the weight of my hair. I did not need to dress up unless we were invited out; but Bindu would plague me to dress up every day. The girl was infatuated with me.

There is not even the smallest patch of earth in the women's quarters in your house. A gab tree has somehow taken root by the north wall near the gutter. When I saw the leaves of that tree flush red, I would realize that spring had come to the earth. In the midst of my household cares, when I saw this unloved girl's heart one day glow with color, I realized that in the heart's world too, there is a breeze of spring-time—a breeze which comes from some far-off heaven, not from the end of the lane.

The unbearable force of Bindus love made me restless and uneasy. I confess that sometimes I felt angry with her. Yet that love made me glimpse a true image of myself, one that I had never seen before. This was the image of my free self.

Meanwhile, all of you thought it excessive that I should lavish such care on a girl like Bindu. As a result, there were endless complaints and objections. When my armlets were stolen from my room, you were not ashamed to suggest that Bindu was somehow involved in the theft. When the police started searching peoples houses during the Swadeshi Movement, you began to suspect that Bindu was a female informer in the pay of the police. There was no other proof of this than that she was Bindu.

The maids in your house refused to do any work for her. Bindu herself would grow rigid with embarrassment if I asked any of them to do something for her. As a result, my expenditure on her behalf went up. I had to keep a maid especially for her. You did not like this. When you saw the clothes I gave her, you became so angry that you stopped my allowance. From the very next day, I began to wear the coarsest mill-produced dhotis at twenty annas a pair. I also forbade Mati's mother to take out the dishes after my meal; I would myself feed the leftover rice to the calves and scrub the dishes at the pump in the courtyard. You were not very pleased by the sight when you saw me at these tasks one day. Yet I never learned this wisdom: whether I was pleased or not did not matter, but you had to be pleased at all costs.

Meanwhile, as your anger increased, so did Bindus age. This natural event made you unnaturally concerned. I am still amazed at one thing: why did you not send Bindu away from your house by force? I know very well that you are secretly afraid of me. Inwardly, you cannot but respect the intelligence that God gave me.

In the end, unable to get rid of Bindu by your own means, you had recourse to Prajapati, the god of marriage. A bridegroom was arranged for Bindu. My sister-in-law said, , "Thank heavens, Mother Kali has saved the reputation of our family."

I did not know what the groom was like; I heard from you that he was eligible in every respect. Bindu clasped my feet and wept, saying "Didi, why need I get married?"

I tried to persuade her, telling her, "Bindu, don't be afraid, I've heard he's a good groom."

Bindu answered, "If he's so eligible, what have I got that might please him?"

The groom's family did not even come to see Bindu. My sister-in- law was greatly relieved at this.

But Bindus tears continued incessantly, day and night. I know what she suffered. I had fought many battles for Bindu in my household, but I did not have the courage to say that her marriage must be stopped. How should I say this? What would happen to her if I died?

In the first place she was a girl, and on top of that she was dark-complexioned. It was better not to think of where she was going or what might happen to her. The thought sent shudders through my heart.

Bindu said, "Didi, there are still five days to the wedding. Mightn't I die in this time?"

I scolded her severely, but God knows that I would have been re- lieved if there had been an easy means of death for Bindu.

The day before the wedding, Bindu went to her sister and asked her, "Didi, I'll live in your cattle-shed, I'll do whatever you ask of me. I beg of you, don't throw me away like this."

Her sister had been shedding tears in secret for the past few days; she wept then as well. But we do not have hearts only, we have the scriptures too; she said, "Bindi, you know that a husband is the sole end of a woman's life. If you are fated to suffer, no one can avert it."

The truth was that there was no escape anywhere. Bindu must marry, whatever befell her.

I had wanted the wedding to take place in our house. But you announced that it must be held in the groom's house-this was the custom in their family.

I realized that your household deity would never endure it if your family were forced to spend on Bindus wedding. So I had to fall silent. But there is one thing you did not know. I had wanted to tell my sister-in-law, but I did not, because she would have died of fear. I adorned Bindu with some of my jewelry. Perhaps my sister-in-law saw this but pretended not to notice. I beg you in the name of righteousness, forgive her for this.

Before leaving, Bindu embraced me, asking, "Didi, are you all abandoning me?"

I answered "No, Bindi, whatever happens to you, I'll never aban- don you."

Three days passed. In one corner of the coal-shed on the ground floor of your house, I had reared a lamb which one of your tenants had sent as a gift for your table, and which I had rescued from the flames of your appetite. Every morning I would feed it gram with my own hands; for a few days I had tried relying on your servants, but found that they were more interested in eating it than in feeding it.

That morning, when I entered the coal-shed, I found Bindu crouched in a corner. On seeing me she collapsed on the floor, clasped my feet and began to weep silently.

Bindus husband was mad.

"Are you telling the truth, Bindi?"

"Could I tell you such a big lie, Didi? He is mad. My father-in-law did not want this marriage; but he is mortally afraid of my mother-in-law. He left for Varanasi before the wedding. My mother-in-law had set her heart on marrying her son off; she went ahead with it."

I sat down, overcome, on the heap of coal. Women have no pity for women. They say, "She's only a woman. So what if the groom's mad, he's a man, isn't he?"

One could not tell at first sight that Bindus husband was insane; but he would sometimes grow so violent that he had to be locked up in a room. He had seemed normal on the night of the wedding, but staying up at night and all the excitement had brought on an attack the next day. In the afternoon, Bindu had sat down to her meal of rice, served on a brass platter, when suddenly her husband snatched the platter and threw it, rice and all, into the courtyard. He had got it into his head that Bindu was Rani Rasmani; the servant must have stolen her golden plate and served her on his own brass platter. This was the reason for his anger.

Bindu was terrified. On the third night, when Bindus mother-in-law commanded her to sleep in her husband's room, she shriveled up in fear. Her mother-in-law had a vicious temper; in a rage, she lost control of her senses. She too was insane, though not so completely as her son, and therefore she was more terrible. Bindu was forced to enter her husband's room. That night he was quiet, but Bindus entire body grew stiff with fear. Very late at night, when he had fallen asleep, Bindu found a means to flee the house and come here. I need not describe in detail how she managed this.

My whole body burned with anger and disgust. I said, "Such a fraudulent marriage isn't a marriage at all. Bindu, stay with me as you used to. Let me see who dares take you away."

You said, "Bindu is lying."

I answered, "Bindu has never lied."

You asked, "How do you know?"

I answered, "I'm certain of this."

You tried to frighten me by saying that if Bindu's in-laws lodged a case with the police, we would be in trouble.

I answered, "They deceived us by marrying her to a madman. Will the court not listen to us?"

You said, "Must we go to court, then? What obligation is it of ours?"

I replied, "TIl sell my jewelry and do what needs to be done."

You asked, "So are you going to go to the lawyer's chambers?"

There was no answer to this. I could beat my forehead in despair, but what more could I do?

Meanwhile, Bindu's brother-in-law had arrived and was kicking up a great row in the outer rooms. He was threatening to go to the police.

I do not know where I got the strength; but I could not bring myself to send back to the slaughter-house the calf that had run away from there to take shelter with me. I said defiantly, "Let him go to the police, then!"

Saying this, I decided to take Bindu to my bedroom, lock the door, and stay there with her. But when I looked for her, Bindu was gone. While I had been exchanging words with you, she had gone out of her own accord and turned herself over to her brother-in-law. She had realized that if she stayed in this house, I would be in great trouble.

By running away Bindu had simply added to her suffering. Her mother-in-law's argument was that her son had not after all tried to eat Bindu up. The world had many instances of bad husbands; compared to them her son was pure gold.

My sister-in-law said, "She's an ill-fated girl. What's the point of being sorry for her? He might be a madman or a stupid goat, but he's her husband all the same."

You recalled the supreme instance of wifely devotion: how a wife carried her leprosy-stricken husband herself to his whore's house. You never felt the least embarrassment about proclaiming this tale of the greatest cowardice in the world. Hence being born a human being never prevented you from being angry at Bindus behavior: you felt no shame. My heart burst with pity for Bindu, but I could not contain my shame for you. I was a village girl, and cast moreover into your household: through what crack had God filled me with such sense? I could not bear this righteous talk of yours.

I knew for certain that Bindu would die rather than come back to our house. Yet had I not given her my word, the day before she was mar-ried, that I would never abandon her? My younger brother Sharat was at college in Calcutta. You know that he was so enthusiastic a volunteer for every kind of social mission, from killing rats in the plague quarter to relief work in the Damodar floods, that even two successive failures in the First Arts Examination had not curbed his zeal. I called him and said, "You must arrange to bring me news of Bindu, Sharat. Bindu will not dare write to me—and even if she does, the letter would never reach me."

Rather than this, if I had told him to abduct Bindu from her house and bring her to me, or to beat her mad husband's head, Sharat would have been better pleased.

As I was talking to Sharat, you came into the room and asked, "What trouble are you starting now." I said, "It's the same trouble that I began when I entered your household—but that was your doing."

You asked, "Have you brought Bindu here again and hidden her somewhere?"

I answered, "If Bindu came, I would certainly hide her here. But she won't come: you need have no fear."

Your suspicion grew at seeing Sharat with me. I knew that you had never liked Sharat's visits to our house. You were afraid that the police were watching him; some day he would get involved in a political case, and drag the lot of you into it as well. For this reason I was even forced to send him my blessings through a messenger on Brothers Day; I did not invite him to the house.

I heard from you that Bindu had run away again, and so her brother-in-law had come to enquire at your house. It was as though I had been pierced to the heart. I realized how terrible was the unfortunate girl's suffering, yet there was nothing I could do about it.

Sharat hurried off to bring news. He returned in the evening and told me, "Bindu had gone to her cousins' house, but they flew into a terrible rage and took her back immediately to her in-laws. They still haven't got over the sting of the expense and carriage-hire she cost them."

Your aunt was staying in your house on her way to Puri on pil- grimage. I said to you, "T'll go with her."

You were so delighted by this sudden evidence of piety in me, that you made not the least objection. The thought was also in your mind that if I remained in Calcutta, I would again create a problem over Bindu some day. I was myself a terrible problem.

We were to leave on the Wednesday; by Sunday it had all been decided. I called Sharat and told him, "By whatever means, you must put Bindu on the train to Puri on Wednesday."

Sharat's face lit up; he said, "Never fear, Didi, I'll put her on the train and go to Puri myself as well. I'll get to see Lord Jagannath into the bargain."

That evening Sharat came again. The look on his face stopped my heart. I asked, "What is it, Sharat? Couldn't you manage it?"

He said, "No."

I asked, "Weren't you able to persuade her?"

He said, "There's no need any longer. Yesterday night she set her clothes on fire and killed herself. I got word from one of the nephews of the house, with whom I'd struck up a friendship, that shed left a letter for you, but they've destroyed it."

Peace at last!

Everyone in the land was annoyed. They began to say, "It's now the fashion for girls to set their saris on fire and kill themselves."

You said, "This is all play-acting." That may be so. But one should reflect why this play-acting takes its toll only of the saris of Bengali women, not of the dhotis of brave Bengali gentlemen.

Bindi was always unlucky! So long as she was alive, she was never known for beauty or talent; even in dying, it never occurred to her to work out some novel means of dying which all the men in the land could applaud! In death, too, she made people angry.

My sister-in-law hid herself in her room and wept. But there was some consolation in her tears. Whatever befell, the family was saved; Bindu had only died. If she had lived, who knows what might have hap-pened!

I have come on pilgrimage. Bindu did not need come after all, but for me there was need.

I did not suffer in your household, as suffering is commonly un-derstood. In your house there is no lack of food or clothes. Whatever be your elder brother's character, you have no vices of which I can complain to the Almighty. Even if your nature had been like your brothers, I might have passed my days somehow or other, and like that devoted wife my sister-in-law, might have tried to blame not my lord and husband but only the Lord of the Universe. And so I have no complaint to make against you—that is not the purpose of my letter.

But I will never again return to your house at number 27, Makhan Baral Lane. I have seen Bindu. I have learnt what it means to be a woman in this domestic world. I need no more of it.

And I have also seen that though she was a woman, God did not abandon her. Whatever the powers you exercised over her, there was a limit to them. She was greater than her wretched human birth. Your feet were not long enough to tread her life underfoot for ever, at your wish and by your custom. Death is more powerful than you. In that death, she has attained greatness. There, she is no longer simply the daughter of a Bengali household, the young "sister" of her tyrannical cousins, the deceived wife of an unknown, mad husband. There she is infinite.

When the flute-call of that death sounded through the broken heart of a young girl to the Yamuna-bank of my own life, it seemed at first as though I had been struck by an arrow. I asked God, "Why should the most petty things in life prove the most difficult? Why should the fragile bubble of a joyless life, immured in this little lane, be so terrible an obstacle? When Your whole earth beckons me, holding out the nectar-bowl of the six seasons, why can I not, even for a moment, cross the tiny threshold of these women's quarters? In this universe You have created, with this life I have been given, why must I die inch by inch in this petty shelter of brick and wood? How trivial is this daily commerce of my life, how trivial are its set rules, set habits, set phrases, set blows—yet in the end, must the stranglehold of this pettiness triumph, and your creation, this universe of joy, be defeated?"

But death sounded its flute-call: "What are these wails of masonry, these thorny hedges of your domestic laws? By what suffering or humiliation can they still imprison human beings? See, the triumphal flag of life waves in the hands of death! O second daughter-in-law, you need have no fear! It takes not even a second to cast off your wifely slough."

I am no longer afraid of your lane. The blue ocean is before me today, and the rain-clouds of Asadh are gathered overhead.

You had shrouded me over in the darkness of your habits and cus-toms. For a short space, Bindu came and stole a glimpse of me through the rents in that shroud. And it was this very girl who, through her death, tore my shroud to tatters. Today, having come out, I find no vessel to contain my glory. He who found my slighted beauty pleasing, that Beauteous One is gazing at me through the whole sky. The second daughter-in-law is dead at last.

Do you think I am going to kill myself? Have no fear, I shant indulge in such a stale jest with you. Mirabai too was a woman like me. Her fetters were not light either, but she did not need to die in order to live. Mirabai said in her song, "Let father, mother, everyone abandon her, O Lord, but Mira will never let you go, whatever befalls her!" It is this holding on which is life.

I too shall live. At last, I live.

Bereft of the shelter of your family's feet, Mrinal.

1914 ("Streer Patra," from Galpaguchchha) Translated by Supriya Chaudhuri



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