Mitra’s Sanctuary
Written by Rohan - California, USA
In Hindi, the formal word for friend is mitra. A mitra is more than an acquaintance. It signifies an emotional bond so deep that its meaning is impossible to translate. When I was four, I met my mitra in a marble-carved temple in Lemont. In a room filled with agarbattī incense and velvet carpets, I spent weekends learning both English and Hindi by visualizing Lord Krishna’s mischievous adventures and Śrī Rām’s heroic feats. Most importantly, I lived it all with Rohan.
We instantly became friends, fueled by the fact that we shared the same name. In the temple halls, Rohan & Rohan learned to light matchsticks for the dīyā we prayed to, make sweet lāḍū as offerings, and convince the paṇḍit to sneak us extra prasādam.
As we grew, we became inseparable, but adolescence shifted something between us. My first realization of being different came on the blacktop of elementary recess. Meters away from the expectations of boyhood, I began years of understanding that I was queer. When I finally expressed my identity, I expected pushback. What I didn’t expect was for Rohan to drift from Rohan.
At the temple, a vast valley seemed to open between us. My sense of familiarity was replaced with repenting unease. I was ten, afraid of making all the wrong mistakes. When others distanced themselves from me, I turned to distance as my comfort. I distanced myself from mantras muttered with diacritic marks in Sanskrit, turned away from the few friends I had left in the temple, and turned away from my higher power, Bhagwān.
In Hinduism, we pray to multiple gods as incarnations of the divine. When the world shut me out for being queer, I couldn't understand why Gaṇeśa placed obstacles for me rather than remove them and why Mātā Sarasvatī hadn't made order of my chaos.
Last year, I reconciled with my faith by reading the Ṛg Veda, where I discovered the deities Mitra-Varuṇa, queer companions seated side by side on a golden chariot drawn by seven swans. Their interdependence of truth with union is beautifully represented in their mutual intimacy. Mitra, the deity of friendship and covenant, was the same word that connected me to Rohan. Their relationship rose above simple categorization. They were companions bound in divine purpose, lifting the Sun and Moon.
One evening at sunset, I returned to the temple alone. As light filtered through the stained glass, I lit a dīyā and whispered prayers to Mitra-Varuṇa, reconciling my seemingly disparate identities. If ancient texts held space for divine partnerships that defied categorization, perhaps they held space for me too. The obstacle Gaṇeśa placed wasn't my queerness, but the false choice between my faith and myself.
Now, at seventeen, I have created my own quiet practices. In my bedroom, a small pūjā corner becomes my sanctuary. Each evening, I whisper prayers to Mitra-Varuṇa, seeking their help to reconcile the parts of myself that others said couldn't coexist. This simple ritual brings me unexpected peace, the same calm I felt as a child in the temple. It is in the delicate flame of the flickering dīyā where I truly find my power. Here, I am whole. Here, I am free.
Slowly, I reached out to Rohan. Our reunion wasn't perfect, but in sharing my journey with him, something of our old bond rekindled. We were different Rohans now, but still connected by those childhood temples, prasādam smuggled in pockets, and the meaning of what it means to be someone's mitra, witnessed by divinities who transcend earthly limitations.
