(AN ALLEGORY)

(Translated by Srinivas from Sanskrit)

There once lived a young and handsome bee in a forest weighed down with tall trees and graceful green creepers that twined their million arms round the unbending monarchs. He was carefully brought up by his father and mother, proud of their parentage, jealous of the world and its evil demands. So he grew up, ignorant of Life and its meaning until one day….

He was full-grown, blue-black as a star-lit night, and with a hum pleasing to the ear. He was strong, nurtured as he was with care and love by his parents. But he could not remain idle for long. And his mother, sighing with maternal solicitude at the inevitability of the Life-Demand, bade him go out among the myriad flowers and gather their nectar for making honey.

Glad of some occupation, the young bee flew away amidst the dark, brooding kings of the forest and came to a sun-warmed pool where a red lotus bloomed with the abandon of youth. Attracted, the bee buzzed round her, the maiden of the waters, and was about to drain her of her sweetness.

The lotus, however, closed her lovely long petals and refused him entrance. She said, "Oh bee, you are just like the rest of your race, coming here, forcing your way in and insolently seeking to rob me of my only virtue–my nectar–and all for nothing. Know now that you will have to buy it."

The bee was crest-fallen, but asked her, "What need you in exchange for your sweetness? Is it not enough for you to blow and bloom on this pool, throwing your fragrance to the four winds?"

The lotus replied, "No. It is not enough. There is something else lacking in my life. You must be foolish not to know what I want. Go, find out and come back."

The bee buzzed away in violent anger, and wove a thousand possibilities as to what the foolish flower wanted, but rejected them all in sadness. He saw a beetle busily grubbing in the earth and went near him. "Oh beetle, do tell me what the lotus wants," he begged. But the beetle answered, "What care I about a lotus? Go elsewhere; I am busy."

So the bee asked a spider, weaving his silvery web in a branch. And the spider answered, "I know. She wants a fly." But the bee knew that the spider was judging others by himself. So he flew off until he espied a cloud passing through the heavens.

"Oh cloud, minion of Indra, what does the lotus want?" he cried. The cloud arrested his progress and said, "Rain-drops." Happy at the solution, the bee buzzed back to the lotus and offered water.

But she laughed and said, "I get that from the cloud and from the pool. Go, seek for what I want."

The bee went away and saw a sun-beam dancing on the meadow. He asked it, and the sun-beam said, "Warmth." So the bee flew back with a fire-fly and tried to warm her.

The flower grew angry and said, "You fool, I get warmth from the sun, not from you. Try again."

The bee once again set off on his search and saw an owl blinking in a tree. He buzzed in his ears and woke him up and said, "Oh venerable owl! Wise sage! Tell me what the lotus wants." The owl replied, "Sleep." The bee went back to the flower and said, "I will lull you to sleep with my hum, and fan you with my wings."

The flower was full of melancholy at the idiocy of the bee, but replied tartly, "I get sleep from the night. Can't you find out what I want? You drive me mad with your idiotic suggestions. Go, seek again."

In despair, the bee flew away again, crying aloud, "Is there no one in this noble forest who can tell me what that capricious flower wants of me?" And fate aided him. His cry was overheard by an old hermit who lived in that forest, and knew the language of all beasts and birds. He beckoned to the bee and said in his ear. "Oh, thou dull-witted bee, this is what the lotus wants," and he whispered it into his ear.

The bee was delighted and flew back in haste to the rose-tinted lotus and said, "I know what you want."

The flower looked at the triumphant bee and, blushing, veiled her eyes. And the bee gave her a kiss. She, in turn, opened her petals and gave unto him freely of her nectar.

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