SOUL’S FLIGHT - A
FLASH OF THOUGHT
S. K. Chari
Thousands of
men and women live and die without knowing the difference between a beech and
an elm, between the songs of a thrush and the songs of a black-bird. Probably in a modern city the man who can
distinguish between a thrush and a black-bird is the exception. It is not that we have not seen the
birds. It is simply that we have not
noticed them. Yet so feeble is our
observation that many of us could not tell whether or not chaffinch sings. They do not know the colour of the Cuckoo.
We argue like small boys as to whether the Cuckoo always sings as he flies or
sometimes in the branches of a tree – whether Chapman drew on his fancy or his
knowledge of nature.
‘When in the
Oaks’ green arms the Cuckoo sings, And first delights men in the lovely
springs, Out of this ignorance we get the pleasure of DISCOVERY.
If we had
lived half a life time without having ever seen a Cuckoo, and know it only as a
wandering voice, we are all the more delighted to the spectacle of its run away
flights.
Remembering
these words of Robert Lynd’s essay on the ‘Pleasures of ignorance’ - I closed my eyes in a revery – but soon my
thoughts took flight like the running Cuckoo-and I was enchanted thought. It
was impossible to take a walk in the country with an average tours man.
It was in September
while strolling in the backlawns of the bunglow, in the early hours of September
morning, my imagination was captivated by a bud, a flower tender with
petals. It all happened in a flash, a
lightning – like thought illuminated the memories of my practice teaching in
the school.
“A bud yet to
blossom, yes: I have before me sweet little children, their innocent faces
beaming with mysterious thoughts. What
puzzles them, I can’t tell. It is to me
a riddle which all my theoretical learning fails to solve. But their hesitant faces fill me with a curiosity
to know what they want to ask. Now, I
can’t ignore it, I will read to them only the pages which make them feel lord
to ask question, the question that will quench my thirst. I will be there only to answer their
question. There are, after all, tender
buds ready to blossom any time, let me experience the job of seeking the buds
opening out in full bloom, let me feel the bliss of blossoming forth my own bud
of in-experience. Aren’t the teachers
and the taught alike when buds blossom:
Look: it is already a blossom, with many petals,
nodding and smiling in joy. Each one
longs to come to me and feel attracted to go to them. Now extremely lovely, innocently sweet they look: Oh, my God:
what an inexpressible beauty; and there is a stir in my thoughts. Yes I will never fail in their moments of
ticklish problems. I shall never,
hesitate to answer them lest the blossom fade and fail. I shall give them the spontaneous answer,
the answer anew in this very class full of kindling thoughts were unfolded to
me from the hidden treasures of tender brains.
Well, they now come to me with curious queries with all
seriousness. They answer with all the
vehemence of thought. I nod in silence,
smile and feel one with them, expressing, discussing, joking, learning and yet
going ahead with hundreds of solutions unconsciously springing up. I never could dream of it – let alone except
it, when I first came to teach them. I
have got more than I could ever imagine.
My union with those fresh, beautiful blossomed petals expression with little
speaking and more of unfolding. Oh,
yes, Rome is a thing of beauty and joy forever; well those, of my children are
all sweetness that excels, and they are a sure source of my joy and
inspiration.
Where am I
not? waking or sleeping: what an agonising experience to see no more flowers in full
bloom, what a day to greet me? Is joy to me forever gone: I have not yet drunk
from those tender brains, I still feel acutely thirsty. So soon, I shall be back in the old world of
books, a lifeless, colourless, lusterless, horrible world, which denies me
intense pleasure and obscures my vision.
Shall I not learn any more from those sweet young children?
“A dried up
tender bud you are I shall never see.”
I closed my eyes.
All of a
sudden, I was shaken up by a shout from my sister. It was a jolt as it were, that brought me back from that
dream-land. my Heaven: what a flash of
thought - a thought , I felt like
pouring out. And so, here it is.
I was
transported to another world, - is it an illusion, a day dream? My introspection took me to the land of
daffodils - in the words of wordworth-
‘For oft when
on my couch I lie’
In vacant or
in pensive mood
They dance
upon my inward eye-
Which is the
bliss of solitude’-
This
soul-searching experiences is an out come of the fervour of the human soul
throbbing with deep love and surrender to its master. It has rarely found
elsewhere such beautiful and sublime expression....