This Radha is beyond my understanding

When I dance this dance, I smile too, because this is nothing like the ideas of romantic love between a man and a woman - that evergreen trope I grew up on. This is, rather, the process of art

Of all the dances I have learnt, there is one that I have the most "It's complicated" relationship with. It's not a vigorous Shiva dance, which would require me to forget my womanness and become all manly and heroic 'veer ras'. It's not a terribly fast pure dance piece with very complicated footwork. It's not a super-long saga based on an epic, which would require stamina and perseverance of infinite proportions.

No. The dance I love to love and yet dread to dance, is a sweet, soft, poetic composition about love between (no prizes for guessing) Radha and Krishna. It has the usual elements of an abhinaya piece of such sort: blooming trees, fragrant flowers, buzzing bees, lovemaking, betrayal, heartbreak, sadness, confession, coping. But it is unusual too, simply because it unravels solely in Radha's mind.

This Radha is beyond my understanding. After she has seen Krishna making love to other ordinary women, she suffers at first, like all betrayed lovers do. And then she does something amazing --- she says something to effect of, "I remember him, and smile to myself. Because this Hari I see, he is not the one who loves me. That Hari I remember, who loves me... He lives only in my heart." Thereon, she goes on to recount and relive all their amorous moments of pre and post-coital bliss: decorating their lovers' bed in the wild, him picking flowers and dressing her hairbun, his incredible beauty that she cannot look away from.

To some this might seem like a typical delusional lover - the tragic filmy staple idiot who refuses to see the reality of love and betrayal. In the real world, I would have gifted this Radha that book titled 'He's Really Not That Into You' and asked her to move on. But in the poetic universe, my logic does not apply. Here, Radha is redefining love in a radical way. Radha never loses sight of the fact that she and Krishna are no normal romantic couple--- he is a God and she a mere mortal, he is destined for glory and she for a domestic life as a married woman. In short, they are no match at all, they have no future together, and she has always known it. Then why does she still love him? What is this love, that we love to celebrate?

When I dance this dance, I smile too, because this is nothing like the ideas of romantic love between a man and a woman - that evergreen trope I grew up on. This is, rather, the process of art. Krishna is to Radha, what a muse is to an artist. That vision of beauty, inspiration, joy, delirium that makes you want to create, to expand yourself beyond the mundanities of life. Does a muse owe an artist trivial things such as loyalty and happily-ever-afters?

Radha knows better. The Krishna in her heart, is that inspiration which strikes us all when we fall in love, when Time and logic is suspended and everything is beautiful --- the stuff of art. The Krishna outside, is the business of staying in love, maintaining relationships, syncing with reality --- the stuff of life. When Radha chooses the Krishna within over the Krishna she can see outside, she chooses art over life. And then she goes through her very worldly life (unlike Krishna's godly life) nestling that world of art within her like a beautiful wellspring.

I find this Radha mesmerising and terrifying, both. Her courage melts my heart but it also scares me. She is invincible. She's the real 'veer ras' that is harder to understand than a mountain-carrying Hanuman, and much harder to show than a universe-destroying Shiva. I wonder, can I ever fully be her? And so she lives within me, like the Krishna who lives within her. Every time I dance her, I glimpse what it could be, to be both art and life. Every single time, I am overwhelmed.