THE YELLOW BUTTERFLY...

The yellow butterflies flittered from one flower to another. The flowers had dressed themselves up in simple, monochromatic shades of yellow, bluntly refusing to wear the multi-coloured dress that Madam spring had strewn for them. Madam spring would have to visit other gardens and convince the flowers in those gardens, to try out the colourful ware she had prepared specifically for this time of the year. The butterflies themselves were attired in random black spots jumping into a sea of yellow.

I have always believed that colour was nature’s way of bestowing beauty on these winged plunderers of pollens and consumers of nectar. Sometimes it would make me wonder if there are there certain conceptions of beauty which are universal in nature and that go beyond ‘the eyes of beholder’. I kept layering my thoughts one over other in an attempt to build a coherent structure and the butterflies kept moving from one pale flower to another, occasionally resting on the bright green leaves.

I found the lustreless, faded golden colour of these butterflies soothing. The yellow powdery colour of their wings did not distract me unlike the other amalgamating, wet colours of visuals and sounds spread out on the palette of life. I often came to the garden to see these sober creatures, wondering how they felt, were they looked down upon by other butterflies that had chosen to display as many colours as there are words in a book. Or were these airborne creatures free from the pretensions of relative comparisons that we human beings suffer from?

My Dadi (Grandmother) had explicitly forbidden me from catching butterflies. Instead, she wanted me to learn to follow the trajectory of their flights. She would often say, “Figure out the pattern hidden in the movements of a butterfly’s’ flight and once you uncover the pattern, you will unearth the mystery to life”.  I would often sit for hours trying to decipher the pattern, the answer to life. And whenever I would ask her, she would respond with a laughter saying that figuring life is something that needs to be done by self and not imparted by others.

So sweet, yet so infuriating....

Dadi also made me understand that real love was to see the butterflies in freedom and to not try and hold them. She would say that if someday I was good enough, a butterfly would come and silently sit on my shoulders, but one could not force such a situation, so there was no point trying. It was something that just happens.

Dadi was my hero, my hero worship was simply based on the fact that she allowed me to have basil and ginger tea. Ma (Mom) was not much in favour of me having tea or coffee. “You should drink milk, it will make your bones stronger and make you grow faster”, Ma would often chide me.  But I loved the smell of freshly crushed basil and ginger added to the milk tea, the aroma both pious and soothing, and for the moments that I was engrossed in drinking the tea, I felt like I was home. I loved to see Ma make tea, my favourite part being, when she added milk to the dark, simmering tea water. The spiral galaxies formed in saucepan seemed to please the angry, boiling black, murky tea water and reminded me of the similarities between our worthwhile yet insignificant lives and the passive yet angry universe. Dadi ensured that Ma used the freshest of ingredients and that the tea was always flavoured with a sprinkling of grudging love from Ma’s side. With Ma and Dadi, my life was perfect and my world was safe. While I continued my search for the meaning of life, I could definitely work with this safety and comfort of being loved.

Recently Dadi had developed an ulcer in her stomach and was not keeping well. The ulcer was perforating the wall of her stomach, to create a hole in the abdominal cavity. Like melancholy sneaking into plains of happiness, the ulcer had housed itself into her stomach and would only acerbate with time. Sometimes Ma would absentmindedly comment, in a rueful tone, that this was the result of excess consumption of tea. But I did not believe that, and in my heart, I knew neither did she.

Dadi knew that her health was failing but her beauty remained undiminished. She constantly reminded me that love lay in observing and smiling without wanting. One could not love, outside of self, till the self was fulfilled. And if the self was unfulfilled, then love was nothing but a distraction; it was a want. And when want enters into the equation, it shifts focus from the object of love to the desire of self from the object of love. Dadi would often hold my hand in a papery grasp and comment, “Interest is always dearer than Principal.” This was her way of telling me that she held me more close to her heart than even Pa (Dad).

Once when I asked her if she was in much pain, she smiled and looked into my eyes and said that she knew she was going to die and it did scare her, but all she wanted was that to live more each day than she died each day. Her aim was to register a net positive in the ledger of life, to live the best life possible. Although I was not sure how this approach helped her in feeling better but it seemed to be working for her and I was happy for that. In my head, life was her secret admirer, one whom she tried to reveal every day. Life on its part would daily display a new face, thus continuing their love story.

The thought of letting go of my hero was something I could never come around. The mere thought of her not being there felt like my heart had walked into quicksand and a slow, gradual process of sinking was underway to ensure that I do not miss a moment of pain. Why does this pain not leave me? Why does it stalk me like a shadow of the mind? Wandering alone, I would often associate the life of my grandmother with the yellow butterflies, simple and fluttering from one joy to another. How do butterflies die, I had never heard of or seen a butterfly die. Maybe, they don’t die; they change their colours and fly away to a new garden.

But Dadi’s bad health was becoming evident and I could not coax myself anymore. Not knowing how to deal with it, I would often run off to sit alone in the garden, the garden with butterflies of yellow colour. After all the butterflies seemed free, free from the bindings that tie us down; bonds that give us strength while weakening us.

Looking at them, I always felt like I was away from home and even though I was home, I was left with a wistful yearning, a longing; a longing for the day that leaves us in vacuum as we sleep away in the afternoon and let it pass, to wake up in evening to hollowness. It felt like I belonged someplace else, a place where pain and sorrow would not come to drag me with them, as they jumped into an endless pit of darkness. I did not belong here, not with darkness; I knew I belonged to light.

Sometimes, some children would come along in the garden, playing and trying to catch these butterflies. I would never stop them but the futility of their exercise bemused me. The exercise seemed futile not because they were unable to catch butterflies but because they would invariably let it go away. Like with life, the feeling of being in control made them feel powerful and excited, while not serving any particular purpose. But not all of the children were like this, some would just stare at the flowers, others would lie on their back to watch the floating clouds in the bright blue sky. The bright blue sky, yeah that’s where I belonged, that was my home, an end to my longing.

I had been feeling very uneasy for the past few days. Dadi’s health had been deteriorating and her movements were becoming limited. The doctor’s visits were increasing and the smell of fresh ginger and basil tea was replaced with the smell of a sanitized hospital room. The smell though clean was still repugnant and I could not bear to stand it for more than a few minutes. The cleanliness of the smell did not arise out of simplicity but of a forced coercion of chemicals and it made my head hurt.

All of this instilled in me a sadness that I could not explain. The sadness that had taken birth in my stomach soon grew enough to start guiding me and my life. If I was the creator of this despair, how did it then grow stronger than me? The despair stood at the door of my heart like a faithful wife always welcoming and always with a smile.

This helplessness sometimes resulted in anger and I would yell at Ma and Pa, get angry at friends. I did not intend to act this way but whenever despair and attachment came to meet my emotions, rationality like a jilted lover, quickly left the room. And I was still trying to figure out the pattern of life. Maybe, the butterflies would have an answer. I started observing them more and more, not out of a desire to observe their beauty but to figure out the answer to life. It was a frantic search, one that I was despairingly falling behind in.

One afternoon when things became too much to bear, I decided to rush off to the park and spend some time alone. It was late afternoon and there was no one there. The sun shone brightly and yellow light sprinted from the surface of leaves to my eyes. I was feeling bottled up and stuffed, and just wanted to cry. I knew it would be a release that would make me feel light and that the tears would take along the burden of my heart with them. Everything was getting heavier and I was unable to shoulder the burden. But what was it, was it just my concern for my grandmother, or was it a manifestation of the melancholy that had been lurking inside of me.

The butterflies..

They did not understand my problems and kept voyaging from one flower to another. Why would they not stop for a moment and understand my sorrow. I felt a surge of anger rise from inside of me as I watched them tease me with their blissful ignorance and carelessness. I was not aware that I had remnants of anger so deep inside of me. On an instinct, I flayed my hand and grabbed a butterfly. The powdery texture of its wing surprised me, and the suddenness of my action ripped a part of the butterfly’s wing away. Immediately, I regretted my action and realised what I had done was wrong. I placed the butterfly on a flower, hoping for it to stay, but instead watched it fall slowly like a dew drop on the clump of grass below. The first thought that flashed through the deep, dark forests of guilt in my head was that I wish I had not done that and how would I face Dadi now? I closed my eyes, murmured a prayer for forgiveness and walked back home.

Not a single tear was shed, however, the guilt of my action balanced the weight of unfairness of the world and I felt lighter.

On reaching home, I could smell the usual comforting fragrance of ginger and basil being crushed. Ma told me that Dadi was feeling better and had requested for a cup of tea. Saying this, Ma smiled and handed two cups of tea to me. Entering my grandmother’s room I saw Dadi smile and nod to me, gesturing me to get the tea. Her smile put me at ease and the guilt that had been birthing inside me passed away from my womb like an undeveloped fetus.

Moving towards her, I noticed that suddenly her eyes were directed upwards at the roof, as if trying to follow something; something invisible, yet fluttering. The eye whites were devoid of any emotion, any life. Her head rolled on her shoulder and her body collapsed. I dropped the tray and ran to support her, despairing at the uselessness of my action and subconsciously striking a bargain with time. Her hands were cold and powdery.

I felt a warm tear well up on the side of my left eye and I blinked to let the tear loose into the world. The room was filled with the fragrance of the spilled tea and the flight of an imaginary butterfly with broken wings flying around in random patterns.