This Above all
Drama of life and death
KHUSHWANT SINGH

Life and death go hand in hand in the garden at the back of my house. This can be best seen in the first half of March. First, the mulberry tree growing alongside my boundary wall, which has been looking like a dead cluster of branches without a single leaf on it, sprouts green dots that cover the entire tree before the end of February. By Holi, caterpillar-like shahtoot fruit "some green, some purple begin falling on the ground." My neighbours pick up what falls on their side; I gather what falls in my garden. It is the prelude to the drama that follows.

The kusum tree stands like a mighty sentinel beside my back veranda. It has been a thick cluster of green leaves all the year giving shelter to a variety of birds. The tree starts looking sick by February-end. By the first week of March, it begins to shiver as if stricken by fever and its leaves begin to fall. Leaf-shedding gathers speed "from one or two a minute, it turns to a shower." Every gust of wind brings a cascade of yellow leaves floating down on the lawn. Every evening there is a carpet of dead leaves on the ground. My gardener sweeps them into heaps every morning and takes sacks, full of leaves, home. This goes on for more than a week till the kusum is denuded of its greenery and looks like a beggar beseeching alms. Its pleadings are answered by way of bright red leaves sprouting on bare branches. Soon the whole tree looks like a pyramid on fire. I sit in my veranda for hours at a stretch, watching the miracle. Will I be there when it reoccurs next year?

The pride of place in my garden is the kadam tree. I planted it around five years ago, when it was barely knee-high. Today, it is around 20-feet-tall and stands right in the middle of the garden as if it was the reigning monarch. Its main stem is straight as ramrod; it branches at regular intervals with broad leaves that are beautifully shaped. It has not yet flowered but it is a sight to behold. When the kusum is not displaying its fiery beauty, I fix my gaze on the kadam. Will I be able to breathe fragrance of its flower before I go?

A similar drama is enacted by the birds that visit me. Sparrows, which used to be the most numerous and noisiest of them, have disappeared. Now I see the tiny tailorbirds, with their tails sticking up, come bobbing around to pick up thin strands of twigs to build their nests. They are followed by a pair of red-whiskered bulbuls on a similar errand. The most common sight are flocks of rock pigeons. An extension of a kitchen of a flat, two floors above mine on the other side, has become their favourite roosting place.

There must be some others that I cannot see because there are dozens of these birds flying from one perch to another. They look alike and I wonder how they know the others’ sex. Watching their behaviour, I can guess — the one that moves little is the female guarding her nest. The only other bird she allows to come close to her is her husband. If a third pigeon lands on the same platform, it is beaked off by the husband. On the railing below and clothesline on which clothes are put to dry, the one which keeps going round and round uttering guttar goon, gutter goon is a male. The other pigeon which sits still watching it, is the female. Soon they’ll build their own nests. By next year there will be many more rock pigeons around my garden. Will I be able to watch them?

Santa and Banta found a thousand rupee currency note on the road. Santa said "Lets divide it fifty-fifty."

Banta: "That is fine. But what will we do with the balance Rs 900?"

(Courtesy: J P Singh Kaka, Bhopal)

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