Sunday, March 21, 2010

A little Prayer

Hello,
First, its not a 'Mr.P' kind of post... no photographs here... but its a little "something" I thought I can share with you.
It was 2005. I was in the second year of my college. That morning I was going back home on a few days break. The early morning passenger train from Mecheda directly used to reach Tatanagar. I boarded that and found a comfortable place for the rest of the journey. The compartment hardly had a dozen of occupants.
My watch showed me 5 am when i saw it happen. Just on the seat across the aisle, I saw a middle aged man placing a mat on his seat. Then he folded the bottoms of his trousers half the distance to his knees. He was barefoot. I kept looking at him. He took out his hand kerchief and tied it around his forehead and head covering most of his hair. It was a summer morning and the sky was lit with a cold golden shade. The windows were open and the speed of the air rushing in matched that of the train. The man then got on the seat and smoothly knelt on the mat he had spread. Nobody else was supposed to see what was happening as the rest of the people were sitting outside the scope of the view. In the knelled position, that man straightened his backbone and head, placing his hands lightly on his slant thighs and closed his eyes. He was about to read the Namaaz.
.
.
.
.
.
This was a blissful sight for me at that time of the day. For a few moments I kept looking at him. Nature and man, both are spreading purity together. My rest of the journey was so very beautiful.


The next one was five years later. 2010. I was doing the night shifts in my office and 10 pm was a 'nothing' of the time for which I had to say back. The water cooler and the pantry are located at the end of a common passage in all my office floors. That night, at about 10 pm, I went there for some water. As there are very few people at night in the office, very few lights remain switched on. The passage had three. One was above the cooler and pantry at the left end, one above the door though which on enters that passage, at the center and the third light was on at the right end of the passage, near the broom cupboard. When I turned back with my water, I saw a man below that third light, in the background of a dark glass wall, standing on a mat, barefoot, tying a hand kerchief around his forehead.

1 comment:

Rashmila said...

beautiful- epiphany just happens :)