07 Nov FOR I WANT THE WINTER TO BREATHE THROUGH ME SO I CAN BLOOM IN SPRING
I switched my graduate school during my first week of arrival in the US, it spun an interstate journey on Greyhound Lines, crisscrossing the prairies of Kansas, the loftiness of Illinois, into the rolling scape of Michigan; Where the Autumn abloom and a receding sun, a colorful welcome for a foreign explorer.
Switching schools meant I had to wait to get on-campus job. By the onslaught of winter, I was employed as a Student Laborer for the university landscape services.
Having grown up in the Himalayas, to comprehend snow without the slope was an alien sight, the rolling glacial stains of Michigan were new to my anxious perceptions. I chose an alias name (Ken) to safeguard my real name, Taran, from tongue rolling hiccups.
At home with chill and flurry of the lake effects, an arena for the soul, a push, a scoop,a metal ledge,a sprinkle of thaw vanishing prints.
My landscape supervisor, Kim, a compassionate master gardener, She would always enquire, Ken, where are your winter gloves.
I’ll muse to myself :
‘For I want the winter to breathe through me so I can bloom in Spring.’
With a smile, an endless playground. soaking the warmth of metal and sweat.
Those years are etched in the memory lane –
the flakes of winter,
the radiance of tulips,
the unrelenting growth of sod,
the heap of leafs.
The cyclical play of life at its very best!