The Old Tree
In the wide expanse of a deserted land stands a tree forlorn and old, with nothing but withering dews to offer to this world. Sometimes, I do wonder what nature holds out for us in all its minute eccentricities. Isn’t there a very profound similarity between the ruthlessness of nature and that of life? How life turns out to be extremely opposite to what you once imagined. How someone who loved ferociously now stands alone indifferent to the emotions enveloping their world. How absurdity rules over every single principle created by the human laws.
As I travel in this vast land of unknown futility, witnessing this tree and with it the very lessons and tragedies this life beholds, I realise nothing worthwhile except perhaps that nothing is worthwhile if you don’t believe in the little magic of things. I read somewhere once that it is a tragedy to carry a mature mind and a romantic heart. I wholeheartedly agree to this because as someone who considers herself belonging to this paradoxical breed, I do believe in this tragedy which constantly creates battles that are unavoidable. But I also believe in the magic that such battles bring in; maybe I am a masochistic person or perhaps I am guilty of reading too much Dostoevsky, but the fact remains that life is a magical realm which might seem the same amusement park from afar but holds exclusive rides for each and every individual entering its realm. Hence, every individual holds their own values and principles to face and live through this life.
As I descend towards another phase of my life, having gained nothing more than a foolish heart and a wiser mind, I can see my life uprooting like this tree, strayed along, unnoticed and alone amidst an equally deserted land of heartless souls. Every person as a child has some idea where they will land in, but most of the times where they do land is absolutely different from what they imagined. Sometimes the world doesn’t ease their way, other times they themselves follow a tangent quite opposite to what they have imagined. I would be lying if I deny that. No matter what turn life takes, what do matters is whether or not that child still lives within you, whether or not its dreams still linger through your heart, whether or not its beliefs still awaken the slight possibility of magic in this real world.
The sanity and rationality dictates that nothingness prevails, but the delusional heart refuses to acknowledge in the hostility of such a despairing world. It searches for magic in the synchronicity of this universe, it searches for patterns that are hard to comprehend, it searches for love in the sea of a practical expanse of man-made bondings. And every time when it falls short, hurled with nothing but abuses and rejection from the patronising world; it bruises for a while yet starts again carrying the scar like a battle wound of being human in a not so human world.
So when heartbroken and dejected, I travel in the landscape of my mind and witness that tree in the vast expanse of nothingness, covered with similar bruises and wounds along, the magic of hope still awakens in me a desire to live and breathe in the emptiness of that barren tree. Like Prince Andrei, I, too, wake up with a new zeal towards life, but without awaiting the tree to breathe fresh leaves. I wake up with a new zeal even in the horrendous possibility of a reality that the tree might never spring again, with a hope so insane that it believes even in the deplorable destruction of life. In that tree, I find a companion of my own withering and a hope that perhaps one day, my dwindling might light a similar ray for another passer-by.
