Myriad Reflections. Shastri Akella

Season of change
I sit in my caged balcony, staring distractedly through the frenzied patterns created by the grills that rise imposingly above me. I notice rare ripples of turbulence prance through the waters of Hussain Sagar, as gray clouds loom ominously over the waters that have successfully trapped the agitation of the oncoming monsoon. Realization settles rather later over my senses (that have been numbed by an overdose of somnolence), that I am in the season that crouches uneasily between two starkly different seasons. Yes, I am in the season between summer and rain, between despair and hope, between unshed tears and crisp, poetry-inspiring emotions. Summer had abandoned the pernicious gnawing at nimble emotions, sore feet, arid limbs, sweat-strewn backs, and disoriented gazes. And rain was yet to settle like a soothing blanket over eager faces that stared emptily into the unending layers of the heavens.
The moment of incessant change fluttered impatiently in the sky above in the form of the clouds that ambled uncertainty – moving a step ahead and then retreating back as if unsure of the itinerary chalked out for them by the deft hands of nature and the seasons. I uneasily shifted my gaze, not wanting to be trapped by the cloud’s allegories that had the deceitful face of change imprinted all over. My life itself lay splayed into a multitude of streams, the ruthless incisions of change so neatly etching themselves along the paths where destiny willed their presence. So a confrontation with such explicit change – even if it were nature’s lyrical tapestry, was the last thing on the agenda of my cluttered mind. The wanderings of my escapist eyes suddenly halted when the fell on a cage. The desire of my gaze to travel transformed itself into a desire to halt, as I watched a little bird flutter in the trapped confines of the cage with mounting interest. Flying in well-practiced circles, the bird seemed to sing an undecipherable song, which echoed from that apartment across the street like a fading dream, like a drowning elegy. Its chaotic flight reached a sudden halt, as it settled on the very end of the perpendicular bars, just below the point where the bars converged with the rusting, fading green roof of the cage. Its eyes rotated wildly within its sockets, and came to a sudden halt as they stared at the skies that appeared deceptively near. I drew in the finer details of the bird as it stayed still there, like a lively moment suddenly frozen in the camera of a dexterous photographer. The birds seemed white washed and streaked with thick, dazzling jets of lapis lazuli. Its brown beak shone with clarity as it curved into an aquiline dip, while its tiny head bobbed ferociously, much like how its eyes had a short while ago. I suddenly realized that the bird pined to embrace the infinite expanse of the skies. The longing gaze that leapt out of its little eyes pierced the sky, and seemed capable of compelling the clouds to shed their heavy tears. As I sat within the bizarre-looking cage like structure that jutted out of my balcony, it suddenly dawned on me, the startling similarity between my life and that of the bird. Both of us – procreations of freedom and dreams, both pinned down heavily by extraneous forces beyond our arena of control. Both sought the fructification of dreams – the bird the kiss of the wind, and I a hopeful letter from an eager publisher. I had been writing now for over three years, and yet, none of my writings have seen the light of the day. Like the bird, I roamed in seemingly infinite circles, never reaching he open door that finally declared the opening of the passage to my dreams – a published work to my credit, and perhaps, in more daring, bold leaps of imagination, a Booker and a Pulitzer. My initial writings were stilted and without life, almost like a stillborn baby. To my delight, over the course of many frustrating nights and feverish writing sprees, my writing has evolved into its own league, unleashing wafts of promise, even if they are minor ones at that. And yet, a concrete fruit of my labor is yet to fall into my lap, I derisively conclude.
I’m sifted out of my ponderous rumination by the bird that has bolted into another round of fanciful flight. I cast my lamentations aside, and observe with mounting interest as that bird settles on the door that leads of the cage. Its look is that of intense concentration as it considers the wooden plug that joins the hole on the door to the hole on the cage. It gives the door an uncertain push. Stubborn rigidity. Impassive solidarity. It then cranes out its head, and holding firmly onto the wooden plug, gives it a slight tug, so that the little mass of wood inches slightly out of the hole on the cage. Drawing its head in, the bird gives the cage door another jolt with its head. This time the door quivers gently, the creek that it unleashes almost reflecting the fear of defeat. The motion of the door fills the bird with fresh streams of ambrosia, and with eyes alit with renewed hope, it tugs at the plug determinedly till the plug is released from the grip of both the confining holes. Spitting the plug onto the floor, the bird gives a confident kick to the door, and the door swings open, as if offering a salutation to the determined, never-say-die attitude of the bird. The bird steps out of the cage engulfed by an almost regal air. And then, flapping its wings, the bird takes off into the air of earned freedom. The scene vividly etches itself into the depths of my heart – the blue tinged bird, with wings billowing in flights of fantasy, as it flits across a skyline that had now rid itself of the melancholic clouds to reveal a deep shade of burgundy. As it roved above my roof, it sang a melody of hope that it had learnt from distant lands before losing itself to the safe confines of the cage. In its hearts, the realization that life was not going to be a fairy tale perhaps dawned grimly over the joy of the acquired jewel of freedom. In the cruel world of beasts where only the fittest survived, it would have to fend for not just its very existence. At the very least, under aegis of the bird owner, safety and food were assured treasures. And yet, it hummed joyfully, for it knew it was in the embrace of the infinite arms of the sky, and in its bounty, it felt at home, just as how a child feels secure in the warm proximity of her mother. What hardships the upcoming days held, the bird really did not care. For now, it arrived to where they truly belong – to the vast immense of the skies – its home; it had regained the lost melody of life, and that’s all that mattered to that little, beaked creations of wonder and beauty.
As I lay surrounded by my observant thoughts, suddenly, in that infinite season of change, an aspiration rose from the ocean of my heart, like a graceful, inviting wave. The bird had discovered its freedom, its destiny. Perhaps, one day, I too will discover my destiny, perhaps I too will live to embrace my dreams, and bury my head in their warm, familiar bosom. The sun was now out, bright as the flicker of summer, and through his light, he blinded out all traces of monsoon that lingered a few minutes ago. Perhaps, trapped freedom will not be the only pitiful cowry thrown in my direction by my diffident fate I surmised hopefully, in that season of incessant change.