Gulmohur

Freedom Song in a Minor Key

On a windy day like this
The rain clouds descend
Rough, tough, male
And the gulmohur
Forgets she is a tree
Rooted to the ground

Everything else thrusts
Upwards, red gold kites
Terriers’ pricking ears

Alert to a drum of thunder
Eagles, and stiffish buds
On small, petulant plants

These rise to teasing bait
The short glamour of sex
Then why not the gulmohur?

Why not she?

Today, the sky is a bowl
Each ribbed gulmohur leaf
An imprisoned angelfish

Swimming round and round
In the cold, grey lucence
Of the hooligan monsoon

But unable to escape, play
Her deft wit off against
A loutish rain cloud

The gulmohur loses heart
Sheds her vivacious fins
Her wild, scarlet flowers

Is this the nature of a tree
To be tied down eternally
Or can the gulmohur be free

Can she?