Indra Das > Quotes

“Intimacy lies in the body and the soul, in scent, in touch and taste and sound. A man whose name you don’t know can tell you a tale to move you to tears, just by filling and emptying his lungs, by moving his tongue and lips, his fingers. Even after, you might never know him.”
― Indra Das, The Devourers

“To tell stories of the past to children who walk into the future is a task both noble and taxing.”
― Indra Das, The Devourers

“One question, foreigner. How do you speak my language so well?'
'A dead man taught me, after I ate him. Just as the Christ taught his disciples the love of their God after they ate him.'
'You're a strange people, you white folk...”
― Indra Das, The Devourers

“Leave, if you think the only way to achieve intimacy is dry custom, the exchange of facts and labels, names and professions. Intimacy lies in the body and the soul, in scent, in touch and taste and sound. A man whose name you don’t know can tell you a tale to move you to tears, just by filling and emptying his lungs, by moving his tongue and lips, his fingers. Even after, you might never know him.”
― Indra Das, The Devourers

“Baba wrote, so I do too. So many years of learning in this house, eating my own tail. A student of the world, but not a part of it. I feel like I am inside an egg, waiting for someone to tap the shell.”
― Indra Das, The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar

“So yes, I do miss the home where I was born, on the distant shores of another reality. But it’s this world in which I saw my grandchild grow up into a beautiful person. For that alone I am grateful to be on Earth. I’ve already lived far longer than this world allows. You’re here to remember me. That’s all that matters.”
― Indra Das, The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar

“Our separation will be a sacrifice, to keep a dream of our reunion alive.”
― Indra Das, The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar

“Everyone born on Earth has an ethnicity. It is, unfortunately, a signature left on our persons by god. That is to say, it is a signature left on us by our own hand, which has learned to write, and describe how we are different from each other, and how we may protect each other from our own hatreds by clinging to the packs and tribes we have made with language.”
― Indra Das, The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar