They Came to Reclaim the Scents

I was told never to sniff at the flowers that were plucked for the gods. So, roses and jasmines of various kinds lay bundled in a torn-off banana leaf mixed with the red and yellow stalks of the jungle geraniums, waiting to be sorted by grandmother. This lesson in never sniffing the smells of the flowers was learnt so deeply that my nose refused to acknowledge the fragrances of these specific flowers, even if they thickened the air inside the house. In the city, where our flowers came from a lady at the corner of the street, jasmines were tied in strings, chrysanthemums were bought in clusters, and roses were bought by packets. Except for a few roses which were made to float in a shallow ceramic bowl, all the other flowers made their way to the gods, unsniffed at, to adorn their feet, or the gilt frames of their photos. Flowers that didn’t have a fragrance of their own took on the ashy fragrance of the incense sticks my mother burnt at the altar every morning and evening. Mulla poompodi ettu kidakkum kallinum und aa saurabhyam. The rock which touches a sprig of jasmines also carries the fragrance of the flowers.

All was well, till one day, as I left for school, I saw a strange person near my house. She looked like she didn’t not belong there, which she clearly did not. She seemed like she was in her mid-30s, with long, dark hair. Her pink sari set off her golden-brown complexion beautifully, and she had a lot of jewels on her, all made of gold. I got off my bicycle and pushed it hesitantly towards her, as though knowing, without explaining why, that she was waiting for me.

‘Hello’, she said. ‘I have been waiting for you. I’m Lakshmi.’

I nodded in reply, not sure what someone who looked like she was getting married at that particular street wanted to do with me.

‘We have a little issue here,’ she continued. ‘It’s not just me. But they sent me first. Wanted to see if everything could be set right just by me being here.’ She looked around, as if looking for someone.

I fidgeted, ‘I have to get to school. What is it?’

‘Oh yes. You should go to school. Saraswati would be mad if I held you up. I can meet you in the evening’, and she walked away. Only then did I notice that a pink lotus was under her feet, and her walk was, in reality, the pink lotus gliding on the even surfaces of my street.

That evening, with the entire encounter put behind me by the woes of a 14-year old’s school day, I cycled back home. In a street with just one small temple, it was unusual to find an elephant, and yet, there it was, a grey elephant, with a brocade cloth hung over him, stood stooping, untied. Nobody was around, except for the lady from the morning, this time accompanied by another woman, and a baby. The woman looked similar to Lakshmi, but in white instead of pink. She held a veena across her hand.

‘Hello, Saraswati’, I smiled at her.

‘I knew you’d recognise me. I hope we didn’t give you a scare.’

‘Not at all.’I pointed at the baby, all blue, and smelling of butter, tugging at a peacock feather on his head. ’Is that Krishna?’

It was Lakshmi who answered, ‘It is. Still stealing butter. Like always, such a pain to control him.’

‘Couldn’t Yashoda have come? To take care of him?’

‘Oh no, she couldn’t. She is not one of us, you see. I mean…’

‘Just because you’re in a story with some gods doesn’t make you a god, is what she means’. This came from a drawling, wheezy voice behind me. I turned to see Ganesha, elephant-headed, round-bellied, and playing with a little mouse that ran up and down his trunk.

‘My mother loves you’, I couldn’t help blurting out. ‘She has pictures of you everywhere. She cuts them out from magazines and wedding invitations.’

‘Oh, I am aware. Would love to meet your mother. Terribly wonderful woman, never forgets to get the pujas done at the temples.’ Lakshmi and Saraswati nodded in agreement, their gold earrings jingling approvingly. Baby Krishna was gurgling, playing in the mud. He took a fistful of it and put it in his mouth, which Saraswati noticed, with a sense of exhaustion.

‘Ever since Yashoda made a deal of finding the cosmos in his mouth, he has loved the attention.  Always swallowing mud and making us open his mouth and gasp in wonder.’

This motley crowd seemed very chilled out to me. All the stories about angry gods and wrathful goddesses seemed to vanish. The two ladies had even gotten comfortable; they sat with their knees bent on their lotuses (Saraswati’s lotus was white.) Ganesha was letting the mouse run around before picking him up in a guffawing laughter and looking at us for approval.

‘Why did you bring him?’, I asked, pointing at the twilight-shaded baby. I leaned against my bicycle, hoping that nobody would decide to come that way, and run into me hanging out with a bunch of eclectic characters, no matter how cool it might look.

It was Lakshmi who replied. ‘Oh, we didn’t plan on bringing him. We wanted the bigger one, you know, Guruvayoorappan was our pick. But there was a slight confusion with the permission letters.’

All three of them looked at the baby, till Ganesha spoke again. ‘This is a serious matter. You know that, don’t you?’

I shook my head, surprised at the sudden change in his tone.

‘Very awkward situation, this is,’ he continued. ‘But here we are, permissions signed from the higher offices, to come see you, as representatives of all the deities in your mother’s alcove.’

I was flabbergasted. All the gods? Representatives? Awkward situation? What was he talking about?

‘We need our smells back,’ sighed Saraswati. I noticed that Lakshmi’s elephant had started spouting coins which tumbled on to the street. Lakshmi heaved herself from the louts and walked over to the elephant and said something, which the elephant apparently obeyed. The shower of coins stopped.

‘Some body is stealing the smells from the flowers,’ Saraswati continued. ‘The jasmines and roses are scentless now, like the chrysanthemums. And we are bothered.’

‘You’re here to complain about the flowers?’, I asked.

Ganesha nodded and took out a long parchment with some scribbles on it. ‘This here is the petition, signed by all the gods in your alcove. We would like the scents back.’

Lakshmi sat on her lotus, and said sternly, ‘There seems to be some error at the human end. Completely accidental, maybe, in all probability. But we’d like you to take a look at it.’

‘This is why you came to see me? Why not see my mother? You know she is the one who prays at the alcove, right?’

‘We did consider seeing you mother, but then, you seemed more open minded about meeting than she did. The adolescent Krishna swears that you smile at his before you go to bed. You seem like a person who’d listen.’

‘Wow’, I said, surprised. I had never expected to run into a bunch on gods at the street corner, let alone a bunch of disgruntled gods with a complaint. And yet, here I was. ‘Let me see what can be done. Maybe something about the flower orchards…..’

‘Yes, please do look into the matter. Serious issue, this,’ Ganesha replied. The two ladies nodded, and the baby was tugging at the elephant’s trunk. ‘We have to go back now. The permission is only to visit you for a day. Please sort this out, or else... Well, let’s just say that you definitely don’t want to run into Shiva here.’

I nodded, and got back on my cycle. The gods smiled and waved, slowly dusting themselves and getting ready to leave. I tuned into my street and cycled as fast as I could to where the flower seller sat in front of her unpainted house. She sat behind mounds of jasmine buds and firecracker flowers, holding a toddler in her arms. I asked for a string of jasmines. Muttering something about something being inside the house, she got up and went inside the house, leaving the toddler among the flowers. The child gurgled and dug his hand into the jasmine buds and brought of fistful of it close to his face and took a deep breath. He let out a big laugh, obviously pleased. I had found the fragrance thief.

When the flower-seller was back, I hinted vauguely about kidnappers of toddlers walking in the neighbourhood. She clutched the baby close to her, and handed me the flowers with a certain coldness. Better the anger of a flower-seller than the wrath of Shiva, I thought to myself.

Back home, after my shower, I took out the flowers from their newspaper packet. I took one single jasmine from the string, and sniffed at it- the sweet smell of night air in summers. I hung the rest of the flowers at the alcove. Ganesha, Lakshmi, and Saraswati seemed strangely more content than ever. Baby Krishna was back to stealing butter. Young Krishna looked out from his frame, with a smile at his lips. I smiled back. I knew I would never cycle back from school and run into the cool gods at the street corner, but I would have really liked to meet young Krishna and listen to his flute strains.