The Best of Ruskin Bond Part 34

Over the broken wall.

While adults slept, I crept away

Down the broad veranda steps, around

The outhouse and the melon-ground. . . .

In that winter of long ago, I roamed

The faded garden of my mother's home.

I must have known that giants have few friends

(The great lurk shyly in their private dens),

And found you hidden by a thick green wall

Of aerial roots.

Intruder in your pillared den, I stood

And shyly touched your old and wizened wood,

And as my heart explored you, giant tree,

I heard you singing!

The spirit of the tree became my friend,

Took me to his silent throbbing heart

And taught me the value of stillness.

My first tutor; friend of the lonely.

And the second was the tonga-man

Whose pony-cart came rattling along the road

Under the furthest arch of the banyan tree.

Looking up, he waved his whip at me

And laughing, called, 'Who lives up there?'

'I do,' I said.

And the next time he came along, he stopped the tonga

And asked me if I felt lonely in the tree.

'Only sometimes,' I said. 'When the tree is thinking.'

'I never think,' he said. 'You won't feel lonely with me.'

And with a flick of the reins he rattled away,

With a promise he'd give me a ride someday.

And from him I learnt the value of promises kept.

5.

From the tree to the tonga was an easy drop.

I fell into life. Bansi, tonga-driver,