The power had gone out in the village again. Outside, the monsoon clouds
had swallowed the moon, and Thatha's workroom — where the long Kalamkari
cloths hung drying on their lines — was completely black.
Kiran stood in the doorway, not wanting to step inside. By daylight he
loved this room: the painted gods, the trees and elephants and peacocks,
the smell of the iron-and-jaggery dye. But now he could see none of it.
The dark seemed to press against his face. He could not tell where the
table was, where the drying cloths hung, where the floor ended.
"It's so dark I can't see anything," he said, his voice small.
"Wait," said Thatha from somewhere inside.
Kiran heard the scratch of a match. A tiny orange flame bloomed in the
blackness, and Thatha's old hands cupped around it, lighting the wick of
a small clay lamp. He set it down on the table.
And the dark was gone.
Not pushed into the corners — gone. Kiran could see the whole room now:
the long painted cloth with Vishnu riding Garuda, the pots of dye, the
bamboo pens, Thatha's calm wrinkled face glowing in the warm light. One
small flame, no bigger than Kiran's thumbnail, had done what all his
straining eyes could not. It had not fought the darkness or pushed it
away. It had simply shone, and the darkness was nowhere.
"You see?" said Thatha softly, sitting down beside the lamp. "Darkness
isn't a thing. It's only what's there when there's no light. You can't
scoop it out or sweep it away. You can only bring a lamp."
He looked at Kiran across the little flame. "That is what Krishna says he
does. He lives right inside the heart of the one who loves him — not far
off in the sky, but inside — and there, out of kindness, he lights a lamp.
The lamp is knowing. And when that lamp is lit, all the confusion and fear
that come from not understanding — the darkness born of not-knowing — just
isn't there anymore."
Kiran looked at the painted gods glowing on the cloth, at the steady little
flame that had changed everything. Outside the rain went on. But the room
was full of light.
