The Devotee

By Swati Ravi Nain

Every Monday, he wakes up at three in the morning. The rosary already beginning its endless loop, slipping bead by rudraaksh bead over his fingers. He is bathed and be-sandalled before the sun has even thought of rising. And then the day begins in earnest.

He sweeps the temple grounds, washes the stone steps, with water lugged bucket by thirsty bucket from the well a kilometre away. Then he begins the arti, lighting camphor, incense, ghee diyas and chanting praises of God in musical Sanskrit. Offering fresh marigolds from the garden, which he will painstakingly tend to, later in the day. Then he milks the cows, tends to the vegetable patch and begins to cook in the massive temple kitchen. Offerings of saffron-flecked sweets, thick rice and milk kheer, laddoos, lusciously orange and sticky sweet, potato sabji and pooris by the hundred cooked in bathtub sized gleaming brass vessels with oar-sized ladles.

Finally, he goes and does the second aarti and gets ready to offer prasad. He lays out one hundred banana leaves and doles out the prasad with mathematical precision and a generous hand. The home of the Lord must always be generous and bountiful he thinks. And an hour later he begins to clear the leaves, empty now, pecked and licked clean by the birds, monkeys, marmosets, squirrels, crows, pigeons and deer who have learned, over time, to come promptly at lunch for this strange prasad, a banquet with no attendees.

Then he spends an hour in contemplation of the scripture, unwrapping tomes gilded with ochre silk. On Mondays he is the priest, on Tuesday and Wednesday he is a farmer, on Thursdays, he is the general handyman, on Fridays he is a supplicant. On Saturdays and Sundays, he allows himself to go slowly to pieces, whimpering into his pillow.

He is the cook, cleaner and general caretaker every day. The temple runs, and the offerings are made. Fasts are kept and rituals are followed. The strange thing is he no longer believes. How could he? How could he believe in a God who would wipe out every human as far as he could tell, leaving only him? On the other hand, he wonders if the reason he was spared was because of his hopeless devotion. He dare not stop and he dare not walk away, lest it’s the only thing keeping him here.

And so on Monday, he wakes up at three in the morning.

By Swati Ravi Nain