AFTER Duryudhana dies, the dawn light slowly spreads, the gamelan music calming down; tancep kayon. The dalang places the kayon, that symbolic mountain, upright in the banana log, dead center of the wayang kulit screen. The story is over, even though there are of course many things yet to be said. This all-night wayang performance is over.

The kayon: symbolizing a mountain, a forest, the signal to begin, the signal to end. From afar, it looks li