There is a certain something about April: its mornings are different from the rest of the months. They are wholesome and serene. The sky looks clear and pure blue, the earth smiles, and all nature rejoices as that eternal rider of the day emerges from the bowl of darkness on the eastern horizon. Welcoming him are the chirping birds and the peepul’s giggling leaves—leaves that have just sprouted … fluttering like the wings of parrots in the morning breeze….

April mornings are surreal beauty: Malaya-samiire winsome winds blowing from the south-west through the fluttering and dancing young copper-green mango leaves, 'incensed' by the wandering kuhoo kuhoo crooning of koyel in Raag Hindola from behind the mango blossoms… bright flowers of different hues swaying all around, while the dancing bees greet them with their sweet drone …. suddenly nature turns wondrously beautiful … certain ineffably touching gaiety comes along evoking romanticism uplifting “the soul to realms above”.

In those sylvan surroundings … … where even plants “… hitaravaha sangharshadiva pushpitaha” — would flower so profusely as though in competition with each other … leaning on the rough trunk of a mango tree with textbook in the lap and struggling to make sense of the sines, co-sines, gammas and thetas that spilled all over the page in the Statics chapter … suddenly tempted by the crooning Koyel… inadvertently joining her … chorusing her … indeed mocking at her (?) to make her sing still more enthusiastically … life past in that pristine sylvan surroundings, amidst the stealthy perfume of wild-flowers in the grass…the humming of bees that have had the honey from vaasantika flowers to their fullest content…. Amidst those innumerable beauties of the April that were arrestingly beautiful … evoking a kind of indefinable Uthsaha, Ullas, Paaravasya — heroic sentiment, delight, ecstasy—those reminisces simply plant “conical trees / of new hopes and aspirations” ….indeed sways the mankind, clears the cobwebs of yesterdays, and makes one’s mind so sharp and clear that snatches of poetry memorized in childhood come flooding.

Early morning winds of April blowing over the jasmine flowers... blowing through the unkempt hair of the young, juggles mischievous new ideas in their minds. Indeed, April is the month of youth: being freed from the grind of classes, lessons, teachers, homework, examinations, and having thrown the books onto the attic, children are at their boisterous best in their restless search for fun and frolicking. In droves, they run into mango orchards … one group, encircling the Mali, watchman, cleverly engages him in innocent conversations … having side-tracked his attention, some from the other group throw stones at mango trees … some climb the trees … stealthily pluck the raw mangoes … run to bamboo bushes, hiding behind them … cut the mangoes, season them with salt and green pepper … enjoy the bite with the fellow brat … enjoy the whole game to its hilt.

They crave for outings to dance in wild glee — to run amok in gay abandon. They even pester parents to take them out on a ride across the country. Hi! Executives. Heed them. Get out of your whirl and muddle of business, at least, for a while. Take them out, let them ramble around free of parental pressure, all in the fresh air of the countryside, for ‘they have their own thoughts’. Let them experience the warmth of April. Assist them in knowing their country, to relate with it and shape their ideas in sync with it, for that is where they have to live for the rest of their lives.

Even otherwise, elders too need a break! One has to get off from the daily chores once in a while and what better way could there be than taking one’s family on a ride across the country. Despite being grown-ups, aren’t you like to do crazy things; want to be on your own fancy rides; to take a bet at your disillusionment, hope, and dream to live a life of your choice, at least for a while, even if it means being a ‘catcher in the rye’?

Why not join the young and run ecstatically in the wilderness, enjoying the multitude of colors of nature at the best of times. Who knows, amidst it, you may reinvent your own youthfully innocent ‘self’ that is hidden all along under the burden of whatever you are doing, and just like that lyricist who, encountering a glimpse of rangeen nazara that colourful vision … of a college lass went around humming in the April breeze—Doondtha huo tujhe har raah, har mehifil mein (have been looking for you in every path, in every assemblage) /Mere mehboob tujhe, meri mohabat ki kasam (O my beloved, in the name of my love) /Phir mujhe nargisi aankhon ka sahara de de... (once again, please grant me the support of your flowery eyes) — you too, flipping into that old life, may muse. Who knows, you may reinvent yourself—all those hidden beauties of your imagined life may sprout jinglingly, an unknown Raag may entwine you as a tender creeper taking you “on the viewless wings of poesy” to Elysium. And don’t you think that it breathes fresh breeze into your whole family?

Once out of the obtuse cities … deep into the country from the mundane routine to the sylvan serenity … from coffee mugs to rolling brooks....from the twanging keyboards to chirping birds … from cacophony to symphony down the woods … watch the moonlight when it sleeps upon the motionless trees, watch it when its rays spreading on red lilies in ponds turns their fragrant water bright red …

Listen to the music of night’s stillness with the beloved … chatter inconsequentially “very gently, cheek to cheek … … each arm engaged in a tight embrace”—the night coming to an end without one being aware of … two dissolving into one “… … quietly whispering into the beloved’s ears: “You are my life … you are the moonlight of my eyes, you are the ambrosia to my body” … ….

What are you then, waiting for? Incredible India is inviting you! Go out of the garish and obtuse cities , deep into the country painted in glowing colors by flowers of different hues on a green canvas, out of the high rising buildings that are blocking the stars in the quiet sky from you, … ‘become the touches of harmony’ with the country folk by donning the robe of ‘invisible hand’, which is sure to help those standing at the periphery earn their living. It’s, after all, in spending that one realizes the meaning of earning. And, as long as this money-cycle keeps wheeling across the length and breadth of the country, the whole of India can rejoice dancing ‘all inclusively’.

Enjoy it as you can, for the Bard warns: Spring’s “lease hath all too short a date.”