The monks chant singsong. No signal on my phone. I want you to listen to this din of Dzongkha. Maybe its Pali. Some bits are surely Sanskrit, which catch my ear. My cellphone is dead. Swaha is soho here. The turns of the tongue are dancing amidst the echo chamber of high rock. Rocks stones moss weed and a piercing ancient voice. A tone of calling out to the deep interstices of history. Water falls like a fast eagle swooping at its unthinking prey.

I pant along the stone steps – up up and up into the dark alcove of the sage, the god of wish-fulfilment. Gods are gamble-makers. Gods are our inner fears. Gods are also thorough chessboard games, in which the last half note adds up in a complete taal. The khayal expands and expands in my ear, until in the last segment, where it contracts. I want you to listen to the mathematics of sound. The universe throbs as the young monks chant, my knees shake a bit. I need glucose. I need air. I need to feel my heart race. I need to feel. Sundown. Descent. Signal restored. The cellphone begins to blink. It rains lightly. Somewhere in the corner of the pink horizon, you speak. “Hello… hello…can you hear me?”

…

Atreyee Majumder is an anthropologist and writer based in Bangalore.