GREEN CARDAMOMS/Gaurangi Maitra
I WANDERED one morning early in January, to where the red silk cotton trees were whispering about spring in green leaves and dark secretive buds. Today, the leaves have disappeared and the buds cup deep reserves of nectar guarded by five long scarlet petals. Every branch is only clad in scarlet blossoms spilling out of dark buds as the silk cotton trees herald spring with glorious natural ikebana. Footloose and fancy free on this spring morning in February, this trobairitz could not but write for you, my readers, the eternal tale of Dharini and Ravi, the love story of the Earth and the Sun.
This blue planet, one out of an immediate family of nine siblings, is the most beautiful, most alluring and the only one alive, with the gift of life, but only when powered by the sun. Life on earth in all its beauty would disappear if the sun did not shine. Does the sun power this blue beauty out of a sense of duty, inevitability of natural phenomena, or because he is in love with her? Would he be desolate if he did not see her every morning? Is that why he wakes her up, with dawn colours, to tease her out of star dust scattered dreams? Is that why the sun lingers over farewell every evening, painting the twilight skies a new, to say do not forget me, I will come back tomorrow. Is the twilight blush actually a reflection of her reply? And as the evening draws the curtains, does she pin them back with a star to catch a glimpse of the sun looking back at her?
Did he first meet her amid her siblings and gaze speechless at her beauty? Or was he taken by surprise at her ever changing moods? Now summer, now winter, now calm, now stormy, now pacific, now volcanic? Every hour brought a surprise as she spun her way through the day. He was never sure what he would see, she was so delightfully unpredictable! Not for her the impenetrable veil Venus’s of unchanging. Never a continuous angry red Martian face or an ever inscrutable huge Jovian face, nor cold Neptune or Pluto whom he could not touch with his warmth. This terrestrial beauty was vibrant, ever changing, with a fascination he could not understand, his solar priorities changed. Not that anyone would question the monarch’s choice of his queen. Only naturally he longed to be close, enfold her, hold her close… he almost boarded his splendid horse drawn chariot and nearly set off when just in time he remembered.
He sank down, head buried in his arms let the reins drop, a figure of complete dejection. When he was initiated into becoming a burning star, he was warned he had the power to give warmth only from afar; he would burn anything he loved if he went too close. Slowly recovering from his grief he called in the royal astronomers and asked them to calculate the least distance he must keep from his beloved. Nobody wanted to be wrong even by a second in a so delicate, dangerous and piquant a task. They were all sworn to secrecy and worked relentlessly. When the calculations were over, on an auspicious day they set out to meet the king. He welcomed them with well cultivated nonchalance but dispatched the rest of the waiting audience with scarcely disguised impatience.
When he first learnt it would mean only a eight minute distance, his joy knew no bounds! He was almost distraught when it actually translated into almost 150 million kilometres! Though he could not fault them, he commanded them to find a way out. After a long silence the youngest of astronomers found that his beloved Earth could be at the minimum distance of 147 million kilometres during the Northern winter or early spring in the first week of January. It would mean he would have to request his unpredictable beloved to dance on an elliptical orbit forever. He was mercilessly bound by his vow. Before he could say anything there she was on his view! Ravi realized it was January; she, he believed had read his heart and mind! The astounded royal astronomers gazed spellbound and later honoured the mean distance from the sun to the earth as one Astronomical Unit (AU). A perfect compliment! ([email protected])