Monday 19 November 2018

The kiss of spring

The house that I recently moved to stands at the junction of a street crisscrossing the road. My house is located in an uncluttered, orderly suburb, discernible with the other known suburbs in the city. However, I am not sure whether it qualifies for a 'top' suburb. Neither do I mind much about qualifiers. Lined with comfort cottages, bordering on red tiled roofed period houses, the suburb road and the streets are lush and lavishly green - the trees throwing in together heralding spring.

When I moved into this part of the city, the trees, imposing and colossal, stood stark-naked avouching the shift in the seasons. It was winter then, receding reluctantly in time. Walking on the road and sometimes the different streets, cushioning the suburb, in the final winter month, I could feel the nature's nakedness with the blue expanse of the sky scrutinising and searching all that colluded beneath, our suburb's spartanism. It was an amazing experience watching the wintry sky, the buttery sun burning soft on the skin.

I had few companions walking their dogs. The pavements were mostly deserted, our road hardly witnesses hustling traffic with few swishing by to evade the expressway traffic as much as they can. The grass patches, hemming in the tree trunks, were mostly slush and sterile. Only the cars parked on the streets, zoomed into indolence. The houses, too, gave into the arms of Morpheus. For the first time in years, revisiting my memories back to a country where I lived for a while, I was face-to-face with human activity similarly shrouded into seclusion. But for now, winter has withdrawn not to be back until next year.

Like our rooms, the trees and its branches were sitting tight, the wilderness laid into waste. On my regular walks down the road to the grocer's and public transport, I used to look up into the early spring sky wondering when shall we witness the trees teeming with life, emerald in colour. The silence of the suburb has already been sweetened by the balmy scent in the weather. I am starting to look forward to the walks, but making no sign of haste as the fresh morning rimy air has delayed the season's prime.

The magic spell did arrive albeit a little late. The thin spray of the sultry breeze has put a stamp on our suburb's environs. Spring has arrived. Leafy throughout, the road and the streets has sprung up flourishing. The liquidambar trees, traditionally found in old English gardens, makes for a blue-green embroidery on our suburb's fabric and fora. Entwining and clinging, the leaves swell in the first flush of the morning. In spring, small spherical heads of tiny green flowers appear, and the blooms are inconspicuous, they are followed by distinctive, spiky, woody seed capsules.

Raw and rousing, the foliage of these trees spread out all embracing, kissing. The nature's first kiss of the season, so fresh and ethereal. Spring is truly the tonic of our innate intelligence, refreshing and renewing. Walking down the road, I feel lively but civic decency bars me from going wild. Else, I would have hopped, skipped and jumped on my way down the lonesome road beneath the rich green mural. These days as I look up to snatch a glimpse of the bright spotless sky, the towering trees embraces me abysmal. The sun rays, seeping through the palmately lobed leaves, pecks on my cheeks warm.

The clouds and the rains, propping up in between, are not pleasing and they do not even greet with good grace. 'Perfection' in entirety, I believe, is just an overtone of being 'phantasmal'. Amazing are the moments only when we cultivate the 'spring' burgeoning in the pink and prime of life. 

Thursday 11 October 2018

The cruise cut loose

Loading, unloading and reloading - in a nutshell, this has been my life since the last two years. Mostly jarred although I did my best to play the game. How much tranquiled was I on the track? Honestly, not much. Often bootless. I was gradually made aware of the flurry about to come down with full force. Surprisingly, I was unprepared for the turn my life had laid out.

While moving in and out, I collected my furs and furniture, casks and crockery, books and baggage, gems and gadgets. What I left behind are the boutiques and the bakery, the lounge and the luncheonette, the banks and the bookshops, the groceries and the galleries. Nevertheless, the personal trusting and the thistle got a pruning. Memories from these movements are like seeds, when randomly dropped, sprouts in our own sunshine to sunflowers. I could not discount the darkness though.

The silence in the anguish flashed back like dusk before darkness. We carry our pains, heavy as a heartbreak, sustaining the emotional intelligence while leaving indelible impressions behind. These have been so true to my life. Even to this day, I acknowledge transporting the agony within though some medication has muted it to an extent. But the memoirs come with the permit from the mind. Never to be erased. 

My connections with most humans have been cold. Some happened to be by chance, casual, not complete. Conversations, from myself, blew like a mist through the mountainous landscapes. Crickets, as in relations and acquaintances, make a lot of noise. We can hear them but cannot see them. When we pass by them they become quiet. Then there are shields people put on. Opaque to innocence, the lapping waves of my deep churning crashed against the steep cliffs and the times uncounted for. With time, a state of calmness, marked by ceaselessly rolling waves, shaped my final movement.

Nature is naked. It crowns us with charm. No wonder nature is healing, happy and handsome. Cruising through nature as in life, I never had the option to choose my cabin. The anticipation of not knowing what I'm going to see upon entering it, or what incredible panoramic ocean views my eyes should watch out for has always abandoned me drifting, disconnected. Nature wends with measured steps - some facile, some labyrinthine. My life's cruise is purposefully rough, testing the spiritual strength forever. Unleashing it into the mystic world of the waters, only to be soaked in an immersive experience, my self-assurance has now dissolved in a fleetingly light fuzz of sweetness, sharp and spiteful.