As you get off the crowded bus,
Walk into the narrow stony path,
With green grass margins either side,
All you see is shade, struggle and life.
As you foot the twisted path,
Growing sound of the flowing stream,
Will welcome you with impounding coolness.
Soon the stony moist path
Will merge with the busy water stream.
Stepping onto the wooden plank,
You will note the paddy stretch,
Miles and Miles you run your eyes over,
Until it gives way to the fading blue hue of the hills afar.
As you walk the soil barriers crack;
Dividing the vegetation you behold-
Some green, some gray and some in gold,
Dancing in the bright noon sun,
Chances are that you will meet,
A man in seventies on a rock,
Amidst the green his innovation.
He will smile to you as you note,
His eager week but once bright eyes.
He shall keep his shovel aside,
Throw the beedy butt away,
And offer from his earthen pot,
Cool well water to quench your thirst.
He shall lead you to his dwelling,
Culmination of his tireless years.
You shall cross the sweet smelling
Garden he nurtured like his child.
He shall tell you the forgone tales,
Of distant wars and forgotten men.
He may tell you of his past;
Of how as a kid he roamed the umpire,
And how he slept on the curbs of lanes.
He may tell you of his deeds,
Of how he fought for his land
Or how he raised his beloved kids
With little more than sunshine and air.
He wont tell you of that thought,
That he concealed deep in his heart,
Of how he thought he could not let,
His children have their dreams in full-
Of how matter deceived his conviction.
But now o' traveler if you will
Go back to that remote valley some day,
You shall not meet the wrinkled old man
For he no longer sits on the moist rock.
But sure does he see the little earth,
Ans sure does he watch his own garden,
From somewhere in the endless skies.
