The struggle to survive amid shivers

Shiv Sethi

Writers and nature lovers dwell on the beauty of different seasons in their own mesmerising manner. Romantic poets like Keats, Shelley and Wordsworth have woven a casement of magic web on the canvas of paper with their soulful expressions eulogising the bounties of the seasons and their enticing charms.

Like a skilful painter with a brush in his hand, Keats splashes the colourful words all around in his poetic oeuvre and spellbinds the readers with a sense of mystic awe. Though I am not a poet, I have a bonding with nature and all of its varied seasonal moods. Undoubtedly, the harsh North Indian summers stand synonymous with harrowing torturers and unbearable torments. This is why they are especially disdained by people with a delicate, candle-like physique. In those cruel months of May and June, when the fierce sun on his chariot of fire rides in the firmament above, the candle-like people either choose to stay in the environs of air-conditioned confines or take refuge in hill stations. I frolic around in my garden and get immersed in the mellifluous symphony of the birds.

Finally after their stint of this year, summer has given way to winter. The early birds will vouch for me as they too must be experiencing this soothing transition and dramatic decline in the scalding heat. Noons are still hot, but the intensity of heat has dissipated.

Again like mornings, the evenings offer a delightful spectacle to our senses. Sometimes a shower here and there incentivises the quotient of our joy.

I am eagerly waiting for the shivers of the season. But the prospects of a harsh winter turn me somewhat pensive and sombre too. Most of my thoughts are drawn towards the homeless living, nay existing, on the pavements and the roadside of our so-called developing country.

As the months will advance, the cold wave will tighten its grip around them. These mortals go the whole hog to beat the chill, still many are defeated in this battle against the vagaries of weather.

No doubt, the poetically much-eulogised winters bring many pleasures and offer a host of opportunities to the privileged to indulge in a variety of delights. They are also capable of hitting a final bone-freezing nail in the icy coffins of many lives. Therefore, when we, the blessed lot, will be binging on winter delicacies, we must come forward and help our downtrodden brethren avert the the bone-chilling weather. Why should, after all, one man’s pleasure turn out to be another man’s pain? A thought to ponder over!

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