" Meanwhile Appu-Kili had caught a dragonfly and with nimble fingers slipped a lasso round its tail. Abida looked at the dragonfly, into its eyes of a thousand crystals. The eyes shone dully with the chronicles of the dead. If dragonflies were memories of the dead, as they believed in Khasak, whose then was this memory? Perhaps it was her mother’s pining images of sin and regret and drowning. The crystal eyes fell on her. "

― O V Vijayan