Saturday, July 6, 2013

Death of a Spring

The window of vulnerability opens to let in the spring. But vultures sitting on the dried branches poke their beaks inside to suck out the hope that had just sprung up from the hinges. Blood is spilled, a hope defiled, a dream insulted. The contours of the tear spilled on the skin looks for suppleness back. The skin's dryness digs out the blood to quench its thirst, only to realize it's poison for the wound.

The warmth that took eons to return to surface from the deep trenches seeps to the floor. The painful process of bleeding and clotting is starting. Will these be the last drops of warm blood that remained in the veins of this ill-fated tree or is there still a hope for another spring? Bleeding is a short lived worry, the tree knows. Bleeding is the wound's angst, it's fury over the violation of the sanctity. It's the slow delicate process of clotting that brings the shudders. The tricks that it plays on you. Alluring you into scratching it away sooner than when you ideally should.

Was this not the spring that it thought it would finally bring himself back from the dried existence. Allured into thawing, it now ponders as the claws of the vulture pierce through its flesh. As the blood drips, it looks into the vulture's eyes. And wonders how could it see the keeper in them. Spun around the bird's nest were the dreams of the spring.

Maali mila bhi to jaadon mein..

Perhaps the tree didn't need a dove. It first needed a keeper. And a keeper did knock on the dried bark a few moons ago. All the water he poured on the ground to revive the dried tree did nothing. The tree further went into hybernation from the cold of the water and looked coldly at the gardener. The more efforts he put on it, the more tree would look at it wearily, fully aware of the wastefulness of the efforts.

And now that the spring is here, there is no one to water the tree, no one to sow the new seeds. The garden longs for its keeper, but there is no one. The dew of the morning has ushered in the grass. There are also bushes growing up here and there. The garden loves them too. But it knows the difference between itself and its distant cousin forest. It requires nurturing, patience and a caretaker that understands the seasons.

Helpless, it looks at the branch on which the vulture now sits. Perhaps, this is what should happen when you seek intimacy in the eyes of a stranger. When you are upset with your own happiness. When in the arms of lust you seek love, not the ever lasting kinds, but even a temporary semblance of it makes you content. Longing for the caressing feathers of dove, the tree had exposed its vulnerability.

And now, as the claws tighten around the branch, the beak too works its way through the skin and sends the tree into a spasm. A pain so excruciating, a wound so fatal and a heart so heavy that gravity seems to be finally winning over the might of the tree.

Yes, it is the same tree that survived the harsh winters. It is the Spring that it is now succumbing to.