The Divine Music

The blaring of horns, the ear shattering noise of the loudspeakers, the deafening of the generators is a part and parcel of the general humdrum of life. These artificial noises have overpowered the sensitive sounds, which could have otherwise fallen upon our 'soft-conched' ears and provided solace to our distressed nerves. Getting up early in morning, and visiting a grove of trees is a heavenly experience. And what could be better than having one or two haunts for birds in your own garden. We have a hibiscus tree in our garden which serves as a safe haven for birds. One simply feels as if transported to another world when listening to the incessant chirping of the sparrows in the mornings. The hibiscus suddenly seems to be all the more full of life.

I am reminded of the poem 'This Lime-Tree Bower my Prison' by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, addressed to Charles Lamb. In it he writes sitting under the lime tree:

...I watch'd
Some broad and sunny leaf, and lov'd to see
The shadow of the leaf and stem above
Dappling its sunshine ! And that walnut-tree
Was richly ting'd, and a deep radiance lay
Full on the ancient ivy, which usurps
Those fronting elms, and now, with blackest mass
Makes their dark branches gleam a lighter hue
Through the late twilight : and though now the bat
Wheels silent by, and not a swallow twitters,
Yet still the solitary humble-bee
Sings in the bean-flower!

The poet mentions, apart from the sights of Nature, the sound as low as that of a humble-bee.

John Keats in his phenomenal 'Ode to Autumn' describes the sounds of the season of Autumn. The Autumn season, which is otherwise associated with death and decay, comes to life with vivid imagery and the sounds of the 'wailful choir the small gnats', bleating of lambs, song of hedge-cricket, swallows twittering in the skies.

There are countless examples of Nature's music in poetry. What we need to have is a discerning ear. We are at this juncture that we have to act fast to save Earth, to save ourselves. Let each one of us plant a tree, may be even in your own garden. Let us make this earth a better place to live in, a place that produces the divine music and not the mechanical sounds.