One of the highlights of being at Vaidyaratnam in Kerala for aurvedic treatment on my recent trip to India was the herb garden. While smelling a rose in the garden one morning I felt something in my chest and remembered Rumi’s poem ‘What was said to the rose that made it open, is being said to me in my chest…’
Indian roses are not the prettiest but their fragrance is divine.
After walking in the garden for nearly two weeks without noticing this gorgeous flower, one morning I discovered the coral jasmine bush . It felt as if something was said to me that made me stop and smell its wonderful fragrance. There weren’t many on the branches, most had fallen down to the ground.
One of the women I had met there, told me the story of the coral jasmine, how the blossoms open in the morning from 5 am, fall to the ground. They are collected in the morning and offered to the gods during morning prayers. They last for only a couple of hours but the fragrance is absolutely divine. And the coral of the stem against the white petals is mesmerising.
According to folklore, a princess “Parijataka”, who was in love with the Sun tried to win the heart of the Sun. When he rejected her, she committed suicide and a tree sprung from her ashes. Unable to stand the sight of her lover, the tree flowers only at night and sheds them like tear drops before the sun rises. It is believed that Parijat (Nyctanthes arbor-tristis) is one of the five trees that exist in heaven. Latin name Nyctanthes has been coined from two Greek words Nykhta (Night) and anthos (flower). The specific name ‘arbor-tristis’ meaning ‘the sad tree’ is supposedly derived from the sad looks of the tree during daytime.
A couple of days later this message landed in my inbox as if to reaffirm what I had felt in my chest – ‘There is a voice within which occasionally gets our attention and tries to remind us of how good and beautiful we are. It calls us from a time long ago when we first arrived for our journey in and through time and space. Those first moments were filled with pure joy, pure play, pure adventure. Whenever you meet someone today with a pure, innocent and trusting heart let them remind you of yourself during those first early years. They invoke the purity of your own heart, and invite you to be innocent again.’ – Brahmakumaris.
You can listen to the Rumi poem in Coleman Barks voice, the man who translated Rumi poems to English and made them accessible to so many of us.