Chapter 10அதிகாரம் 10 பேராசை Greed

Those who grasp beyond a handful lose the handful itself.

Sand pours back every handful dug from the pit; desire, every handful taken from it.

Taking from desire means getting what it wanted. Dry sand slides back into any hollow dug in it.

He locked the room with his gold; he locked his own room too; he locked himself too.

Heaped grain dies of nothing but the heat of its own breath; those who heap it never see this, even in a dream.

Grain piled deep warms from within as it breathes, and that heat spoils it.

He buried his gold in the dust and went to dust himself. And what is that wealth to others?

Others: those who come after, if anyone ever finds where it lies.

‘If there is enough, I’ll give,’ says the man who heaps up wealth; he never has enough to give.

The fuller grows the man who grabbed from the common store, the colder grows the hearth across the way.

Even a hundred lamps, all set in one place, leave the six directions dark.

The six directions: north, south, east, west, above and below, the whole world around.

She blocked the river, killed the field, killed the village, and lost land of her own too.

He heaps, he heaps, and heaping still, he passes; after all he heaped, a pit.

The Tamil word for pit is also the word for a grave, and for any empty hollow.