It had rained all through the night and though the dawn opened somewhat dull and damp, it didn’t look as if it would rain right now.
I lay on a small patch of green on the shoulder of the hill. Beneath me, the rain fed grass, plump with the fill, felt like a bed of sponge and though the blades spiked slightly, they didn’t exactly hurt. The train of showers had mellowed them and taken the sharpness out of the edges.
Around me, centuries-old maples, home to an ever-changing army of red-billed black-breasted blue Magpies, swayed and spoke softly to each other, their voices flowing over me like a mountain stream. And in the in-between spaces, a momentum less breeze, drugged with unseen droplets sleepily dragged itself from tree to tree, carrying the messages.
The sky was a mosaic of clouds of every make and mood. The burly grey ones, burping frequently and growling even more frequently were huddled in the west, as if busy in some conspiracy. In the rest of the anodyne azure, the lighter and whiter ones wandered about, like kids in a playground. A few of them had even mischievously entwined themselves around the snow peaks lining the distant horizon, for an uninterrupted view of which I had woken up before predawn and taken position on the hill, abandoning all comforts.
The steep ascent had taken a toll on my system conditioned to escalators and elevators. But after reaching the vantage point, the accumulated exhaustion, like bird droppings, had unknowingly fallen off. Soaking in a sea of stillness and serenity, I was slowly rediscovering my robbed energies as around me the seconds ran, the minutes jogged and an hour absentmindedly ambled along.
Then all of a sudden, a sharp little sunbeam parting the clouds peeped in with full intensity, forcing me to close my eyes momentarily. When I opened them again, the scene in front had undergone a sea change.
The playful clouds had shifted position and gone after the sun, liberating the line of peaks, which, like a string of divine gems, were glistening in full glory.
It was magic, sheer magic.
Pyramids of pristine white, tips dyed a dying a rose and untouched by the miseries that groveled at their feet. The very sight of them lifts the soul to limitless heights and unknowingly the trivialities and drudgeries of daily existence pale into insignificance. The clogged pores open up and the mind expands to accommodate the broader and better picture of life, which only a privileged few are fortunate to gain access to.
With a cleansed and healed mind I now effortlessly raise myself to touch the tune of eternity which rings in the nature around, the experience of which is sure to stay with me even when I descend from the attained heights into the womb of earth where I have to return to.
S Saha
