Vaitarna....

Green. A very wet, very Hopkinsian “glad” green, carpet of foot-long blades, with the back-drop being six hills and three hillocks: silver-grey, with a blue blanket and a mist-scarf. Raise your eyes a bit, and the skies seem to be in celebration; with three big garlic-bread-loaf-shaped clouds (Sreejith or Vidya would know the exact term) converging towards each other, and towards the hills. A steady breeze stroked the happy grass. The sky was overcast: white and grey (a very promising monsoon-sky); and there were rain sprinkles, occasionally. Towards bottom-right was a boisterous, rain-fed, muddy stream: the only rough presence around. But, though “rough” is a hard word I use, the stream was not a disturbance to the beauty of the place. It was, on the contrary, completing the picture: much like what some naughty kids would have done in a family photograph.

Put all of the above in a rectangular frame and you might be able to see what struck me through the 3’X2’ bars-less window of a Shatabdi Express that was bringing me from Bombay to New Delhi. The name of this place, or of the nearest railway station, is Vaitarna. Looked like one of those places that He seems to choose as promotionals for heaven.

17th August, 06.