Chapter 90அதிகாரம் 90 அடைக்கலம் Sanctuary

For a bird with a snapped wing, even the small shade of a leaf that comes its way is the sky.

High ground is a fortress only to those who have known a flood; to those who have never known a flood, that same ground is pale earth.

A refuge is an open gate to those who come in from outside; to those who have never gone out, it is a prison.

For those who live in fire, shade does not come to mind; the heart calls the fire itself shade.

For a woman who has refuge, even a grass hut is a house of gold; for a woman whose roof is gone, even a temple is a wilderness.

Whoever has taken refuge closes both eyes; refuge itself is the eyelid of the eye.

The birds that stay on it singing each in their own melody: this is the worth of the tree that bears them.

If a bird comes seeking a tree and that very tree brings it down, it is no tree; that tree is a hunter.

Hard tears, held back for a thousand days, come at the word ‘mother’.

Whoever reaches a refuge sleeps; that refuge is a place where the watch never ends.