The Moon, the Oak and the Peacock
Eons ago, when Earth was but a sandy abstract of nature and peace, there was a spanning green under the humble rule of a prince, who was fair and kind but lost and confused. On a bright sunny evening, when the sun smiled lovingly at the moon, the prince looked up at the sky as the celestial beings hung in the stretching blue. ‘Oh, veiled Moon, show me the secrets you hide when you let the sun shine, for I am fair and kind, yet lost and confused; what conceals you so right?’
The moon takes his time to reply, because the voice he used rarely, lurched out in a cluttered hesitance; ‘I conceal not but my sleeping body, for a moon needs its rest from a zillion years of routine.’ The prince, satisfied, albeit sorry for the mystical moon, spotted an oak tree staring at him with innocent curiosity.
Approaching the oak tree, the prince himself fell into wonder. His face contorted in a soft scowl, he questioned to the towering frame, ‘O Great Oak, with your branches reaching Heaven and your leaves dancing in the breeze; how does the flood not sweep you away like the numerous pitiful cattle?’
The tree laughed, but not because it found the prince dubious and below, but because it was happy someone asked her something no one ever did. So, she answered courteously, for she was polite and mannered; ‘When the water makes my way, I tell him the rage he is consumed in does not tether me to his will, for as he is free and unwilling; I am rooted and growing.’ The prince, blinking in understanding, stepped away from the oak, watching a peacock strutting nearby, crooning in content.
Awash in newfound apprehension, he inquired the peacock tentatively, ‘Majestic bird,’ he began. ‘How do you flutter in harmony, when your life needs two hands and a clapping beat to sway you in its tune any time it wants?’
The peacock was sad, but dignified. They chirruped, ‘Kindly Prince, beauty I am to most, life’s chosen sorrows is what I breathe. What it takes from me, I make with my thousand-eyed feathers; for more than one pair of eyes is needed to comprehend the wisdom in each pain, a rectifying ambience in the most drowning blue.’ With that, the peacock bowed and left, the prince thoughtful as he returned to his hut to call it a day, having learnt so many things today.
