Chapter 44அதிகாரம் 44 உடல் The Body

Across a thousand flowers the foot goes unfelt; a single thorn makes the foot known.

One who dwells in fire does not know the fire; the water sweated out on his skin is the fire itself.

Something falls: before the cry, a hand reaches out; after the cry, a tongue says, ‘I caught it.’

Before the calf’s belly-cry has entered her ear, the cow stands still and looks at the calf.

A ‘belly-cry’ comes from deep in the body: the cry of hunger, or of any deep need.

Though the name of what was squeezed is not known, the scent on the hand knows the way of the squeezing.

His garment did not slacken; he did. The day his body wasted, the illness knew it.

His clothes hang loose because he has grown thin; the illness registers the wasting before he notices.

The head says the load can be borne; the flesh, failing to bear it, knows.

While the dancing lasts, a break in the step goes unheard; on a day when there is no dancing, the bone hears it.

To the eye of one who walks, the whole land is a spectacle; to the eye of one who lies down, an enclosure.

No one expects a painless wound to hurt; the painlessness itself is the disease.