Spwing!!

Wow, published April 4, 2010, am republishing this --because I have not published anything for easter.  I know it was a week ago, but I need to honor it.  Normally our easter means feathers.  I have published several  So read it and see how new I was in the country and how fascinated with the traditions. I loved learning about all the traditions and rituals. Also, this is when I was still writing poetry. Have not done it in years. Hope you enjoy this.  A very yellow and bright and 'daffodilly' post!!

Nothing real on the blog for a while.

Its not just that I have been busy, there are many other reasons, but they will follow.

I just want to write about what major events have been happening--nature-wise in my environs.

On my way to work yesterday, I noticed something that I had not noticed before. Two blocks of stone, right in the middle of the patch of ground outside the university. They must have been buried in the snow all this time. Both have the same face carved on them, but one has eyes closed and the other has its eyes open. I wondered what that was. I am assuming, it defines/symbolizes what the university stands for. We are barely alive when we come to the place of learning, and with the right combination of desire to learn and teachers who want to engage us in learning, we leave with our eyes open.

We are changed and the world is never ever the same again.

Just like in places where you have four seasons. With every winter, we have a stronger belief in summer and spring and we learn to enjoy autumn and winter with just as much fervor.

We are changed, because change is all around us. And if we do not change, and evolve, we are dead anyway.

Only a few days ago, we were covered in snow, three weeks ago, we got 36 hours of snowfall.

But last week, when I came home the snow had magically melted. The ground emerged, as if from way below the sea level. The trees sort of have a bit of their dignity back, now that every branch is not twisted under snow.

They are beginning to show their color, a little green here, a little life in that brown bark. The ground is still hard.

But there are daffodils. They are called Pask Lily--Pask meaning easter. So, Easter Lilies.

I could go and write a whole essay about how Christianity is mainly a northern hemisphere religion. It makes sense here. In Fiji and Botswana and most parts of India, neither Christmas, nor Easter make any sense.

But the point is that, it is a time of resurrection. Renewal, hope, and life.

Instead of Easter bunnies, we have witches and roosters. And ofcourse, eggs!!

Much chocolate, usually sold in egg shaped containers.

I had to go into town today to pick up some papers and I realized that the restaurants and cafe’s have arranged their chairs and outdoor seating area. Enticing the customers, seducing the public. Ah, but what else is spring for!!

Why, I am taking so much time out of my tight schedule and writing this is because today, as I walked to school, I stopped by a bare tree, that was tall and stood with its usual elegance, as it did through the winter. But now, instead of snow, there were drops of melted snow, hanging at the end of every branch, every little vein that had survived this winter, that I am told was the coldest in the last twenty years.

The drops were not frozen but not supple like warm water either. They just hung, like the fog above us. Waiting for their completion. Maybe waiting for the sun to absorb them, back into the vast, infinite nothingness!

I simply sighed and walked on. On the way, to the university, I saw these beautiful flowers.

As I stopped to see them.

Crocuses!! My mind said.

White and purple. Spring.

The grass is still quite brown, but in the middle of the parking lot, sans snow, there were some signs of life. And I think they were not planted. So they intended themselves, just like nature. Crocuses for weeds in Sweden, orchids for weeds in Fiji!! How could we complain?

No matter how hard winters are, spring always comes. Hope always remains, sun always shines, may be not often, may be not forever, but always returns.

Why then do we think of time in a linear way?

Time is not the reality, it is an idea created by the self, to make sense of things (From a meditation course that I follow online).

I end here with a poem I wrote the year I started Phd. That spring I had much to consider so I wrote to make sense of things.

Splling

Dew Drops on a Cob Web,

Smiling,

glistening,

like diamonds,

cannot be matched,

cannot be replicated;

gentle breeze,

surpassing the cooling gadgets

considers us human,

stretched days-

allow us naps,

young flowers

inspire us to smile,

rain comes home

like a long awaited guest

and leaves us the gift of a rainbow,

another toddler learns to call out-

splling!!