Living Life Dangerously...

That night the skies rented and deluged the land. I lay awake to the rains pounding, drumming to heartbeats, quickened, elated, pumped up with adrenaline, to the percussion of thunder claps, flashes of lightening. In the blind black of my room sounded the running, pacy changing beats of teen-taal in this megh-night.

Next day, I started late for the farm. The underpass on my route was unpassable, thigh deep in water. Backtracking to catch a bus, I found that the morning rush hour had already started. The buses rushed by periliously tilted towards road with people hanging out in swarms. One such bus was stopped at the traffic signal, going in my direction. Running between wavy lines of halted cars, vehicles, I reached the bus and yelled at the people to 'make space' - a woman standing on the last step turned smiling and said "there is no more room inside" - I hesitated, undecided, weighed by a big clumsy bag that I carried in one hand, when the traffic signal turned green. The bus inched forward, and suddenly, without thought, I was squeezed between people, hanging out the last step, on this tilted bus, hanging on to my bag with one hand, and my hold on life with another....the bus sped on shiny, wet tar within reaching inches of other cars, scooters.

The wind blew against my face pushing my hair back - I was the last person on the bus - excited, elated, happy to be living life dangerously.

Blue Megh

The clouds oppressed, lightening split the skies, thunder rolled, the damp earthy fragrance arose even as rain dropped in big globs on my upturned face.. blue surrounded everywhere, all blue, indescribable blue of ink, prussian, royal, navy merging into raven blacks...the regal Megh blue of Indian miniatures, of peacock dance, of crashing waves - as the alaap unfolding with excruciating expectancy of long drawn awaitings, no rhythms yet, no beat of a steady pour....and then, all longing removed, rain drum down to a pakhawaj beat, soon to a dizzying, torrential unbearable speed, the voice and the drum merge with colors, each challenging and challenged....I sat in an auditorium, exposed and drenched in rain cascading over me, streaming all around, elated, drunk on this evening's Dhrupad in Raag Megh.

Gold Grey

Today was unbearable- so oppressively hot! I spent the entire morning stretching to a very late afternoon walking amongst plants, shrubs, vines, trees, Lilly pads, in an abundance of green intermixed with brilliant neons, within short stretches of cool blue to once again exposed under blinding, scorching sky. My friend and I were visiting a large, fantastic, exuberant tropical nursery - and doing what we like best - looking at all kinds of plants for our gardens. In defiance of the light, heat, we roamed sweating, sweltering, singeing and yet greedy - to see more, smell more, buy more. Our heads were full of dreams of our transformed gardens, visions of paradise. We returned home with the car packed, spilling plants, shrubs in tiny containers.

I got to work almost immediately. The sky was getting ominously dark - the air completely still; a storm was about to break and I had a lot to do. The earth needed to be dug, pots to be emptied, saplings to be planted into the garden - before the rains hit. Barely half an hour into the project, the first thunder cracked, lightning lit a yet bright grey sky. The rains started in a rush - no gentle prelude, no light drizzle. Rains fell like big coins polka dotting the road, dark black on shiny grey. I continued working, faster, happier than I had been in a longest while. The rain pelted my back even as I was enveloped in a heady aroma of the earth smell, a feel of radiating heat from ground, and cold deluge from above. I worked silently and fast, grinning within. My son called out from inside, out of concern - I just smiled, laughed at this foolish joy of choosing to be out in this ridiculous downpour.

When I was done and showered and changed, I sat at my window. The whole world was bathed in a gold light - a late evening, dark grey light of antique gold, burnished to a dull, luminous, sheer sheen. The new greens were hung with crystal drops, in lines and rows, all tremulous, transparent, reflecting the golden light, lit also from inside. My lotus garden and the new Lilly pad danced to the rainy rhythm, throwing off sparks of water light to this beat. Far off a Koel sang as the rain slowed, the light waned, and I turned away, towards my home - all my dark dispelled, all the grey covered with gold.

A Return to Ladakh: First Impressions

My first impression, from my first visit to Ladakh, still remains etched with vivid clarity. I remember landing within the pages of unreally beautiful, hardbound glossies of sharp clarity, unbelievable colors, and unimaginable scale - awed, dwarfed, a tiny meaningless speck of life crawling over vast pages of ungraspable reality. First shades of spring were appearing on an otherwise icy, barren landscape- first flowering tufts of early apricots, faint neon green highlights on grey twigs of trees, rich colors in coffee, plum, jade of boulders, hills, against seamless circle of white peaks around. I was ready to be reborn.

My second return caught me unawares - summer had set into the valley- crystal streams in turquoise gurgled, emerald ferns frothed from every nook, clumps of wild lavender swathed the land, rose bushes burst with a million blossoms in white, pink and gold, green barley fields were heavy with grains and swayed in silvery waves to a flirting, languorous breeze - warm sun melted my icy, hard core - I rejoiced in my rebirth, laughed with the entire creation, saw the world anew-for I was-eternal and integral to all around me.

My return to Ladakh this time was a seeking:

"Buddham Sharanam Gachami"

I seek shelter in Buddha - the cognisant Buddha within, for the quiet wisdom of the inner to be revealed. Not to revel in any rebirth, or playfully participate in any maya theatre, but for solace of an inner silent solitude, a retreat to 'just be'-no books, no music, no computer, no telephone, and no attachments - no lover, no friend, no children, no need to nurture, nourish, create, fulfill, no need to be anyone, anything, but me, just me, to watch, wonder, ponder, and if possible, shed even that, words, thoughts, action - just cognisance - an awareness without filter of culture, history, identity or dreams, desires, plans for future.

I discovered a Ladakh of antique gold, beaten silver, burnished copper under deep, clear cobalt skies - Indus and Zanskar now coursed in old green to fresh blue turquoise, through a land spent and now cloaked in gold, brown-gold, trees aflame in orange, yellow, red - torches towards heavens that poured gold dust down. Scarlett apples weighed down boughs, baskets of apricots, walnuts spilled down in marketplaces, wild jeera was being harvested from hills. Endless cups of gud-gud chai (salty yak butter tea) was now drunk at every home, tea shop, gompa - warm, nourishing, consoling- accumulating reserves for the lean, harsh season ahead. I wandered in restful quietness, walking miles within this miracle, finally realising that in birth and this awareness, 'I have been graced!'

Golden Showers at IISc

As skies clear out, air crystallizes, temperatures drop, and earth changes from the monsoon range of inky blues and dense charcoal grays, to light translucence in regal reds, orange and gold, Bangalore sports its own celebration of this season with a burst of festival colors.

I walk down the forest track behind residences at IISc. and the ground is littered generously with gold - I look up at a canopy of tiny gold blossoms on an ancient tree against blinding clarity of blue skies. Smallest breeze bring a shower down, raining gold wisps on ground, shrubs, leaves, me...a sharing of the wealth it has amassed over this year from earth. Walking a bit further, I am startled by the the neon pinks, coppery sheens on a young peepul celebrating the return of the sun with a burst of new, young foliage. Almond trees on the Badam lane are changing shade too - here the dowager sporting deep shades in autumn of her age - maroon, crimson, ochre are favored after a year of youthful greens. Pride of India is similarly seen, abandoning shades of green, to colors of a richer hue, chinese reds and antique pinks set off coppery pods of coffee sheen.

Heart rejoices,
destabilizes,
poetic stirring,
murmur within,
life is beauty,
in autumn too,
I laugh at mirror,
my love renewed.

Journeys Ahead: Goa Beckons

It is with a bated sense that I am getting ready for another interlude with Goa - once again a dark, blue, limpid, monsoon Goa. Images float in my head, memories of the past visit, a love affair, short, brief, tantalising, full of promises to return. Through the year, I have carried this Goa, as a secret lover, hidden, luring, adding color to my days, a vastness in my heart. The vastness of infinite skies poised close, almost touching, achingly to a needy lashing ocean, whipping its passions to frothy silver, reaching , breaking over a wet, rain drenched land of gold and grey...small polka dots drawn painstakingly on sands with chiffon border, drawn and redrawn with every rush of rain, every breath of monsoon winds, ups and downs of swollen tides, and broodingly witnessed by the dark, swaying, sentinel palms. The sound of this loving, and yielding, fills the world. The desire of the skies to bear down and join this game of land and water, crackles with frustration, roars with anger...and all this plays a turmoil on my awakened heart - my lone footsteps weave between water and sand, marking and quickly disappearing, as this vanishing moment of love and life.

Megh Swirling Inside

Yesterday afternoon the drama started unexpectedly-after an uniform gray and dull morning, at the siesta hour, the skies suddenly darkened to a heavy blue-black; within minutes, thunder roared, lightening sliced, electrified, water gushed through a torn universe, pelting, pouring, flooding; silver streams curtained my view outside, watery world with watery sounds, gutters overflowing in waves of melted earth; I lay watching in stillness, melting; the unquiet outside, now stirring inside-a dancer, a dervish stood up and pirouetted within my ordinary exterior, in swirls of silver, white, happy in a secretive abandon within the dark blue of Megh- now inside.

Transparent Days, Transparent Heart

Bangalore is blessed with a climate, temperate, cool, green, central in the dusty, bouldered, searing, tropical, deccan plateau, in southern India. And then even amongst our normally sylvan days, there are times that really stand out. Autumn days have suddenly descended amongst us, cold, clear, transparent, bathed in pure light-illuminating our world with radiance, our lives with an unexplained joy. Fresh out of the delayed monsoons, our green world is now internally lit, in pockets of jade and emerald,sparkley and clear, to wipe away the cobwebs, unexplained, unnecessary, to soothe tumultuous hearts, to quieten our days, to let our spirits breathe in deep-the cold, clear air, humming to gentle melodies, of calm and quietude. Time to retire, to rejuvinate, and learn to live, again.