The God of Small Things, post 4

Underlined quotes from Chapter Five and Chapter Seven (I didn't underline any in Chapter Six), read while waiting hours in line at the DMV:

page 122-123:

Both she and he knew that there are things that can be forgotten.  And things that cannot - that sit on dusty shelves like stuffed birds with baleful, sideways-staring eyes.

page 153-154:

Each breath she took was like a war won against the steely fist that was trying to squeeze the air from her lungs.  Rahel watched her mother breathe.  Each time she inhaled, the hollows near her collarbones grew steep and filled with shadows... She didn't know where she was, she recognized nothing around her.  Only her fear was familiar.  The faraway man inside her began to shout.  This time the steely fist never loosened its grip.  Shadows gathered like bats in the steep hollows near her collarbone.

page 155:

     The steel door of the incinerator went up and the muted hum of the eternal fire became a red roaring.  The heat lunged out at them like a famished beast.  Then Rahel's Ammu was fed to it.  Her hair, her skin, her smile.  Her voice.  The way she used Kipling to love her children before putting them to bed: We be of one blood, thou and I.  Her goodnight kiss.  The way she held their faces steady with one hand (squashed-cheeked, fish-mouthed) while she parted and combed their hair with the other.  The way she held knickers out for Rahel to climb into.  Left leg, right leg.  All this was fed to the beast, and it was satisfied...
   The door of the furnace clanged shut.  There were no tears.

The crematorium "In-charge" had gone down the road for a cup of tea and didn't come back for twenty minutes.  That's how long Chacko and Rahel had to wait for the pink receipt that would entitle them to collect Ammu's remains.  Her ashes.  The grit from her bones.  The teeth from her smile.  The whole of her crammed into a little clay pot.  Receipt No. Q 498673.

page 156:

There are things that you can't do - like writing letters to a part of yourself.  To your feet or hair.  Or heart.