The Animals in the Meadow

The flower, a single sunflower, was blossoming at the edge of the meadow and I watched it with bated breath. With Kumbhak. I was almost lost in the refulgent yellow of the flower when suddenly a voice, distant yet distinct, pierced through the hue and caused me to open my eyes.
“Ah! Please look at Aminura. Her knees and thighs are not an inch above the ground and this is one should ideally be sitting when performing Gomukh Asana.” The Yoga instructor said, gesturing her hand towards me. She nodded her graceful head in approval and said after a couple of seconds’ pause, during which several pairs of eyes turned in my direction, “I have not met many people who have her flexibility. It does not seem so improbable a thing to say that her body can be folded as neatly as a handkerchief and put away in a handbag.” I could feel that the gazes were still fixed on me but for the first time in my life, I was not embarrassed. Nothing has ever revealed my gaucherie so starkly as have the occasions when I have been commended for some reason. Whenever someone praises me, I involuntarily become stiff and nonplussed and if anybody makes the unfortunate mistake of commenting, even if in a casual manner, that I am ‘looking good’, I implacably turn hostile in the defense of my plainness.
Naturally, therefore, I was surprised that I could accept the generous words of Geeta, the Yoga Instructor, with such equanimity. In fact I forgot them the very next second when I shut my eyes again to search for the lush meadow, where I was a little while ago. I heard Geeta’s gentle voice asking us to stand erect and fold our hands to form the Namaskar Mudra. She said, “You are about to begin Surya Namaskar. Picture yourself praying to the Sun at dawn.” I breathed in deeply and found myself watching the Sun, a sphere aglow, rise from in between two snow capped peaks at the horizon. As the pale azure turned brighter, I too bloomed. I was the sunflower in the meadow in a mountainous valley, I realized.
The next very moment, I grew into a tree, tall and sturdy, when on receiving instruction from the voice to do so, I stretched my arms up and then, to the back while I stood on tip-toe. I next bent forward and saw myself shrinking into a shrub of some kind. I next saw myself morphing into a magnificent steed that galloped in the meadow (while performing Ashwa Sanchalan as a step in Surya Namaskar). I subsequently transformed into a mountain and a serpent. I also became a toad and a tortoise living in a pond in the dale while performing Mandup Asana and Kurma Asana.
Each and every creature in the meadow, picturesque and secluded, was I, myself.
As I finally laid on my back in the position of Shavasana, I visited the verdant meadow for the one last time. The dusk was settling in and a balmy breeze was blowing over it. Under a tree, I saw a little girl sleeping and smiling to herself in her dream, perhaps. I vaguely felt I had seen her before; yes, she is the girl in one of the photographs in my family album-she was me!