Fuel to Fire: When Devi Asks for Distance

Fuel to Fire speaks from a moment of great intimacy — not from distance.

By the time this voice appears, relationship with Devi is already established.
Contact is frequent. Presence is familiar. There is no longer any question of belief, invocation, or trust. She is already near — near enough that speech matters, attention has weight, and even devotion leaves marks.

And it is precisely from this closeness that the paradoxical instruction arises:

be gone, be far away.

This is not a reversal of relationship.
It is not withdrawal of grace.
It is Devi protecting what proximity has made volatile.

At this stage, every word offered to Her lands too heavily.
Every attempt to remain close feeds movement where settling is needed.
What once deepened intimacy now accelerates fire.

So the command does not come from separation —
it comes from too much contact.

Devi begins to teach not through union, but through restraint.
Not because closeness was a mistake, but because it has completed its work.

This is how the instruction must be understood:

step back, not because you are unworthy,
but because nothing more should be added.

Silence here is not absence of love.
It is love that has learned not to interfere.

This is the threshold where devotion stops moving toward Her —
and begins to make space for Her next form to arrive.

Only after this moment does Dhumāvatī fully manifest —
not as distance chosen, but as distance that no longer needs to be managed.

This song is the quiet turning just before that shift.

The lights have already dimmed.
The fire still burns.
And Devi, from within intimacy itself, asks for room.

Verse 1

Do you want me on your mind
Or do you want me to go on
I might be yours, as sure as I can say
Be gone, be faraway

This verse is spoken from within intimacy, not from distance.

Devi is not asking to be invited.
She is already present.
The question arises only because Her nearness has become constant enough to begin exerting pressure on the mind.

“Do you want me on your mind”

Here, the mind is no longer the place of ignorance —
it is the last remaining container.

To be “on the mind” means to be held, remembered, oriented around.
At earlier stages this was devotion.
Here, it has become interference.

Devi is asking whether the devotee still needs Her to be mentally present,
or whether the relationship can move beyond mental hosting altogether.

“Or do you want me to go on”

This is not withdrawal.

To “go on” means:
to continue unfolding outside the mind’s jurisdiction.

It is Devi asking permission to pass beyond the last point where She can be managed, named, or stabilized by attention.

“I might be yours, as sure as I can say”

This is not uncertainty — it is truthfulness.

Even in deep intimacy, Devi refuses the language of possession.
Union has occurred, but ownership has not.

She acknowledges closeness without allowing it to harden into claim.

Then comes the instruction that sounds contradictory unless this stage is understood:

“Be gone, be faraway.”

This is not banishment.
It is protective distance, introduced by Devi Herself.

At this point:

• words accelerate fire,

• closeness still generates motion,

• attention adds heat.

So Devi does what only She can do at this stage:
She asks for space from within presence.

Not because She is leaving —
but because what comes next cannot be approached.

This verse marks the final moment where distance is still a teaching.
Immediately after this, distance will no longer be instructed —
it will simply arrive.

The tone is not severe.
It is tender, exact, and calm.

This is how the Goddess speaks
right before She stops speaking at all.

Verse 2

Roses on parade, they follow you around
Upon your shore, as sure as I can say
Be gone, be faraway

Devi continues speaking from intimacy — but now she names the after-effects of closeness.

“Roses on parade” are not blessings in the naïve sense.
They are symbols of devotion, beauty, recognition, even subtle reward — everything that begins to gather around the devotee once contact with Her has matured.

They follow you around.

This is crucial.

Nothing here is sought.
Nothing is performed for applause.
And yet, resonance creates visibility. Fragrance spreads. Forms arrange themselves.

At this stage, the danger is no longer ignorance.
It is accumulation.

“Upon your shore”

The shore is the boundary — the last line where form meets what cannot be held.
Devi is already there. The waves already touch.

But what gathers on the shore can still be mistaken for arrival.

Roses can distract.
They can soften vigilance.
They can turn proximity into identity.

That is why the instruction returns, unchanged:

“Be gone, be faraway.”

It is repeated not because it wasn’t heard —
but because attraction has become subtler.

Earlier, distance was needed to prevent burning.
Here, distance is needed to prevent seduction.

Devi is not rejecting beauty.
She is preventing beauty from becoming a resting place.

This verse marks a refinement many never pass:
when the Divine removes not suffering,
but ornament.

And She does it gently.

No condemnation.
No stripping by force.

Just the same calm instruction,
spoken again,
from even closer:

do not linger where things begin to bloom.

Pre-Chorus 1

Like fuel to fire

This line is Devi’s diagnosis — brief, exact, without commentary.

She does not accuse.
She does not explain.
She simply names the mechanism.

At this stage, relation itself has become catalytic.

What once deepened intimacy now accelerates movement.
What once clarified now intensifies heat.
Even correct gestures — attention, prayer, tenderness — no longer soothe.

They add fuel.

This is why the phrase is isolated.
No metaphor is developed.
No lesson is drawn.

Because nothing here needs interpretation.

Devi is not saying that contact is wrong.
She is saying that contact has completed its function.

When fire no longer needs to be fed, adding fuel is not devotion — it is interference.

So this pre-chorus stands as a pause between verses:
a moment where Devi stops narrating experience
and simply states the truth of the moment.

Not dramatically.
Not as warning.
Almost softly.

The restraint of the line mirrors the restraint being asked for.

Nothing more needs to be done.

Verse 3

Pious words to cry into the under
Upon your shore, as sure as I can say
Be gone, be far away

Here Devi turns to the last refuge — the most difficult to relinquish.

“Pious words” are not hypocrisy.
They are sincerity refined to its purest form: prayer without demand, language shaped by reverence, speech that once opened the way.

And yet now, even these are cried into the under.

The “under” is not ignorance.
It is the depth beneath meaning — where words no longer rise, where nothing answers back.

Devi is not mocking prayer.
She is showing what happens when prayer has reached its limit.

At this stage, sacred language does not offend — it simply falls through.

“Upon your shore”

The image returns, but it has shifted.

Earlier, the shore marked the meeting of closeness and form.
Now it marks the place where even refined devotion can no longer cross.

Everything arrives here — and stops.

So the instruction is repeated once more, unchanged and unemphatic:

“Be gone, be far away.”

This is not a rejection of holiness.
It is the Goddess removing the last structure that still does something.

Pious words still move energy.
They still vibrate.
They still feed the fire.

Devi asks for distance not because prayer is false,
but because silence is now truer.

This verse often feels the most painful — not dramatic pain, but tender loss —
because it marks the end of speaking beautifully.

And Devi does not rush it.
She does not forbid.
She simply lets the words fall,
and asks the devotee not to follow them down.

Pre-Chorus 2

Oh, what a day to choose
Torn by the hours
All that I say to you
Is like fuel to fire

This pre-chorus names the last strain before release.

“Oh, what a day to choose” is not about decision in the ordinary sense.
Nothing is being chosen between options.
It is the recognition that a turning has arrived on its own schedule.

A day “to choose” means: a moment where continuing as before is no longer possible.

“Torn by the hours”

Time becomes abrasive here.
Not dramatic, not urgent — just wearing.

The hours do not guide.
They pull.

This is the quiet fatigue of sustained proximity, where even waiting has weight.
Nothing is wrong, but nothing can be prolonged.

Then Devi states the truth again, now with tenderness exposed:

“All that I say to you / Is like fuel to fire.”

This is crucial.

Earlier, the line described what the devotee adds.
Here, Devi includes Herself.

Even Her words now inflame.
Even instruction interferes.
Even guidance sustains the process that must end.

This is the last moment where teaching is acknowledged as still occurring —
and simultaneously declared insufficient.

So this pre-chorus closes the circle:

• first, devotion became fuel,

• then prayer,

• now even Devi’s own speech.

What remains is obvious and unspoken.

If even the Goddess’ words add heat,
the only remaining act of grace
is to fall silent.

And that silence is not absence.

It is the opening through which the next form arrives —
without announcement.

Chorus 2

Into the town we go

Into your hideaway

Where the towers grow

Gone to be faraway

Never do we know

Never do they give away

Where the towers grow

Only you will hear them say

Sing quietly along

Sing quietly along

“Into the town we go / Into your hideaway”

Here Devi shifts the scene from the intimate threshold back into movement — not retreating from the world, but re-entering it without center.

“The town” is where structures resume: roles, circulation, exchange, visibility.
The “hideaway” is more subtle — an inner refuge that feels protected, private, almost sacred. Devi names both together because at this stage they are no longer opposites. Public and private have begun to blur.

This is where danger usually returns.

Not through craving — but through containment.

“Where the towers grow”

Towers are vertical meaning.
They are vantage points, interpretations, elevations built from experience.

Even refined contact with Devi can be turned into height.
Perspective hardens into position. Insight becomes architecture.

Devi does not accuse this.
She simply notes: towers grow on their own if nothing restrains them.

So again:

“Gone to be faraway”

Distance is not exile.
It is the only way to prevent verticalization.

Not everything that rises is ascent.

“Never do we know / Never do they give away”

Here knowledge itself is withdrawn — gently, without polemic.

What is unfolding cannot be stabilized into knowing, nor handed over as content.
To “give away” would be to turn presence into currency.

Devi refuses that.

This is why the final instruction of the chorus is not silence, but attenuation:

“Only you will hear them say / Sing quietly along”

Not proclaim.
Not teach.
Not even interpret.

Just resonance — low, unassertive, unclaimed.

This is the last refinement before speech fully falls away:
when one can still sing,
but no longer lead the song.

Devi does not disappear here.
She lowers the volume of relation until nothing can be built on it.

And that restraint is the final mercy
before even restraint is no longer needed.

Before the Widow Appears

This song does not end in separation, loss, or resolution.
It ends in restraint.

What Devi teaches here is not how to draw closer, nor how to let go, but how to stop adding. Stop feeding, stop explaining, stop refining intimacy into structure. Every line has already done its work; every gesture has already landed.

“Fuel to fire” is not a warning against desire or devotion.
It is the quiet recognition that the relationship has reached a point where even closeness must be handled gently. Where love itself knows when to step back.

This is the moment just before Dhumāvatī fully manifests.

Not as catastrophe.
Not as punishment.
But as the natural arrival of a form where restraint is no longer practiced — because nothing is left that could interfere.

Here, Devi still speaks.
Still names.
Still asks for distance.

Soon, She will not.

What follows is not deeper instruction, but non-intervention. Not silence chosen, but silence that no longer needs to be maintained. The fire will not be extinguished; it will simply stop needing fuel.

This song prepares the body for that shift. It teaches the art of standing close without touching, of loving without feeding, of remaining present without leaving traces.

Only then can the Widow appear —
not to take something away,
but to remain when nothing else is being done.

That is not an ending.

It is the moment when the path steps aside
and lets what has already arrived
finish arriving on its own.