Animation

It was literally a stairway to heaven. Imagine ascending it under twilight. Evening. Thursday.
Two floors it rises, before coming to a halt at the terrace. Not exactly twilight. It is the uniform gold and pink and purple that seems to wash over the universe.

The trees - those are the first things that you notice. Trees swaying madly even though it's only a mild breeze. Maybe it's just the vibrance. I see the cuckoo nestled in the tree, her eyes searching. Is she looking for her lover? Why isn't he back? A hungry eagle, perhaps? A cat? The eyes pierce everything while her invisible ears must surely be perked up, straining to listen. No. It is not a 'she'. The woman is missing. And he is pining for her. Evenings are the best to mourn the loss of a love. But a sudden flutter of black wings and she is there, nipping at him playfully.

Such associations we make! The random interlude of two cuckoos caught in a poetic circle. How trivial! Mortality. That's what made us make up stories. Living a life with a perpetual expectation of death, it is purely natural that we glorify our existence.

Associations. Rhymes without reason. Make-believe patterns and imaginary fears. This is what mankind thrives on. The subtle wave of the tree speaks volumes when it shouldn't. A stray dog in the street looking for morsels. A hunt for survival turned into a reality show by people on the balcony feeding dry bread to it and haggling over whose turn it is to throw the crumbs.

There are numerous dhrishti bommais adorning the terrace railings on every house. Ancient charms to protect the insecure people in their flimsy dwellings. And all these charms are usually grotesque faces - a Hindu version of the gargoyle. But they are not scary. They stand (or are they sitting? It's just their heads, you see!) with their faces turned towards the distant horizon. What are these friendly demons saying to each other? Are they, perhaps, talking about humanity's desperate need to anthropomorphize everything around it? Do they want us to let them be so that they can happily practise voodoo?

How much had the clouds been part of my childhood! And now, they look mean and threatening for having ignored them. One huge cloud in particular is slowly taking the shape of a giant walking over mere mortals. Like Atlas holding up the sky. Slowly, inch by inch, he steps over invisibility, banishing all thoughts of the clear sky above. No, he is not banishing the view. He is teaching us humility. To lean down with the face hunting the clouds; to wait for a glimpse of the vast, unmoving, ever-changing permanence that is the sky; to spread the arms in bliss as infinity smothers us with love - the clouds are here to teach us that.

Where is the other soul - that other person that centuries of writers and poets promised me? Where is the person who can lean down with me? Pining? Why, I sure am! Seeing the evening in all its vastness can not only be humbling but also belittling. I want to be secure in the foolish knowledge that these things that I experience don't go unshared. My eyes search.

There! A woman in a saree, staring at the horizon. She doesn't look as if she is contemplating what to make for dinner, or whether to bring the dried clothes in. She is just looking. One more. A man. Two other girls, stopping their shuttlecock match to drink in the splendour. We - that housewife and that college kid and those two girls and the rest of the dhrishti bommais - look towards the horizon. Anticipation. Suspended animation.

I wept as I held mankind's collective breath - waiting for the next second.