Music in Nature
Of Morning Walks and Melody
In our Park Avenue, little and big green things are growing so quickly that it looks like one of those time-lapse photos one sees. Just last week the assiduous army of gardeners who attend to the Park, had trimmed every trailing branch and stem that was jutting out into the walkway. Today, they have all extended their arms again, laughingly thumbing their noses at both the gardeners and us. So all through your walk around the park, there are these green arms stretching across the path.
Don’t try to avoid them. Let them touch you. Walk as close to them as you can. Throw up your arms and touch every leaf and branch within touching distance. Walk on the leaves that the gardener has cut and dropped on the way. Feel them crunch and whisper beneath your feet. Where the sun has not stolen in with his warm fingers, the dew still reigns, in fat drops clinging to blades of grass and leaves of plants. As you pass beneath the bougainvillea, the Tamhan, a tree with funnel-shaped flowers of the lightest shade of mauve, and the laburnum, some of their petals drop down on you, in gentle benediction.
Overhead, an army of raucous parrots are quarrelling about who makes the most noise, perhaps. And on the ground, egrets are mincing with delicate finesse, picking at the food so plentifully supplied by nature.
Come to the Park. Or to any Park, grove or wood. Bring your children. But leave your mobiles at home. No, you don’t need music: there is enough music in the air. You don’t need religious music blaring out of your pocket, either. You can see God all around you, in the Park. And if you can’t, what gives your God the right to disturb mine? If you are the kind who needs ‘workout music’ to walk, perhaps it would be a good idea to have the music in your head, rather than your headphones, and walk in tune?
All of us have our precious music as a memory in our head. All we need to do, is be quiet, and listen to it. It can seep into your soul, you can hear it in your heart, and your mind will keep it moving.
If you allow it to.
