“A stirring warmth flowed from her, as if her heart was trying to come out to you concealed in one of those breathless, thrilling words.”

“Now, her mother lifts Kavita’s head up out of her lap and holds her face, hot with tears, in her cool hands. “I am glad it is you who is going,” her mother whispers. Kavita looks up at her with shock.“I won’t worry about you, Kavita. You have strength. Fortitude. Shakti. Bombay will bring you hardship. But you, beti, have the strength to endure it.”And through her mother’s words and her hands, Kavita feels it—shakti, the sacred feminine force that flows from the Divine Mother to all those who have come after her.”

“For so long, I’d wanted to hear those words fall from her lips. I’d just had no idea that in those words there would be so much sadness, that they would be tainted by years of her sorrow, and that my own thrill in finally hearing her say them aloud would be tarnished by the immense amount of resentment over what she had done.”

“‎"Matter flows from place to place, and momentarily comes together to be you. Some people find that thought disturbing; I find the reality thrilling.”

“This was it. Kiyomi realized it now. This was what her heart had reacted to. Her heart thrilled to mitochondria.But why?”

“If my words don't flow out of a heart that rests in God's control, sovereignty, then they come out of the heart that seeks control so I can get what I want.”