Moments Eternal

The Mother’s Close Rapport with Plants, Flowers and Trees

After Her tennis, the Mother would come to the Playground and take a short walk. The children continued playing while She walked around the Playground. On the northern side of the Playground there was a boarding for little boys and girls. A neem tree stood inside next to the wall, a very beautiful neem tree. When the flowers bloomed on this tree you couldn’t take your eyes off them. Their sweet fragrance filled the whole Playground. The Mother’s name for these flowers was ‘Spiritual atmosphere’. When the Playground was renovated and a new building erected in its place the boarding had to be torn down and this neem tree uprooted.

I had the privilege of walking alone with the Mother in the

Tennis Ground. One day all of a sudden She told me: “We will go to the Playground and walk a little.”

So we were walking there that day when the Mother suddenly stopped under the neem tree and leaning against the wall She started telling me stories. The Mother loved this neem tree very much. The flowers of this tree would suffuse the Playground with their spiritual atmosphere. The tree looked unbelievably beautiful as if the Mother’s love had increased its life force. Like Krishna who by playing his heart-rending flute under the Kadamba tree gave it his love, the Mother also would stand under that neem tree and permeate humanity with this all-pervading spiritual atmosphere. The Mother had named the Kadamba flower ‘Supramental Sun’. I still remember the Kadamba tree in Doctor Patil’s courtyard when it was all covered with flowers.

The Mother did not like trees and plants to be cut down or leaves, flowers and fruits plucked without reason. Trees would go and complain to the Mother. The famous Banyan tree in the centre of Auroville came one day to the Mother to express its grief. So the Mother sent a sadhak to Auroville to find out what was wrong with this tree. When the sadhak arrived there he saw an axe had been stuck into the tree. He at once removed it and returned to the Mother to inform Her about it. There are innumerable such stories that reflect this deep friendship between the Mother and trees.

The Mother used to go for walks in a famous park of Paris which had huge ancient trees in it. The Mother meditated under one such tree. One day while She was meditating these trees came to Her to tell Her of their sorrow. It had been decided to chop some of them down. The trees complained to Her in their language. We could never imagine that such things could happen.

On the first day of every month the Mother gave with Her own hands all the inmates of the Ashram their essential requirements for the month. Around two o’clock the Mother would go through Pavitra-da’s room, cross the terrace and go to the southern room of this block and take Her seat. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother had lived in this block at one time. Everyone came in a line and took from the Mother’s hands his or her monthly requirements. The first of every month (known as ‘Prosperity’ day) was a particularly busy day for the Mother. The Mother’s day began with a rush of activity in the morning. As soon as we were informed that the Mother had returned to the Ashram people would rush through different streets as if in a race to see who would climb the staircase and reach Her first. How could we leave the Mother sitting alone! Needless to say no one could keep up with the Mother’s pace. She did all Her work with such lightning speed that even machines lagged behind. Even while receiving blessings from the Mother’s hand I would get extremely nervous for fear that the flowers might drop from my hands in the rush.

An amusing incident comes to mind. On one such ‘Prosperity’ day I was walking to the Ashram in a hurry. I knew that the Mother had already reached there because just ahead of me a man was heading for the Ashram with his son. They were walking quite fast and from time to time the father kept urging this little boy to walk faster. Poor boy! He was so tiny that he could not keep pace with his father’s stride.

“How can I walk as fast as you? I am a shishu (a little boy).”

The father angrily exclaimed:

“You are not a shishu but a poshu (animal)!”

As soon as I heard this I burst into such uncontrollable laughter that I had to sit down on the footpath. Only when they had moved further away could I start walking again.

The Mother had finished the ‘Prosperity’ distribution and come out. Lots of roses had bloomed in the pots on the terrace. It was still very hot in the afternoon and the sun was very strong. As soon as the Mother arrived in the passage through Pavitra-da’s room She cried out loud:

“Don’t pluck them!”

Nolini-da, Amrita-da, Pavitra-da and the others who were present there were taken aback on hearing the Mother’s voice. She said:

“These roses came and complained to me that they should not be plucked at odd times.”

The poor sadhak who wanted to pluck the roses and offer them to Her was terribly embarrassed.

Similarly when the Mother was in Japan and would go to pluck carrots or some such vegetables a few among them would cry out:

“Pluck me! Pluck me!”

And those that were not ready would exclaim: “Don’t pluck me!”

Isn’t it extraordinary! The Mother has such an intimate rapport with all things. It is through incidents like these that we found out about the Mother’s deep kinship with the world of plants and flowers. We came to know that plants could talk. Even the scientists have not yet been able to prove that plants can communicate. Of course Jagdish Chandra Bose had discovered that there was life in plants and that they could feel pain and sorrow just like us, that they had consciousness and felt joy and sadness. He invented an instrument in order to prove this about plants. And that marked a new beginning in the world of science. Jagdish Chandra Bose became a muchadmired scientist.

So this neem tree was finally not chopped down. Pranab and the other elders knew how much the Mother loved trees. However this tree had to be removed from there so it was finally decided to transplant it by lifting it out of the soil with a crane without causing it too much pain. The tree was finally moved with a lot of patience and effort and it was planted in the Dining Room garden near the gate. Unfortunately the poor tree could not bear the shock of all this transplanting. And it did not survive. We all felt as if we had lost a member of our own family. You readers might feel a little astonished by all this but this is how we learnt from the Mother to love trees.

There is so much research going on today in the world of plants and trees. Deserts have been created in so many countries because too many trees have been cut down. That is why people have at last woken up. It is only now that they have realised what a bond of friendship exists between man and nature. In several countries movements for planting trees have been initiated. Many organisations have been set up to promote this and they even have a tree-planting day every year!

I got diverted into telling you so many things while talking about this neem tree. So let me get back to the real subject. The Mother came and stopped under this neem tree and suddenly said:

“You know at every second everyone is put to a test.”

I was taken aback. A test? I had just completed my studies and come to the Ashram. I felt a huge relief at having finished school. The moment I heard the word ‘test’ it made me think at once of school and college. I was extremely scared of tests. Even now I dream that I am getting into a room to take a test. Everyone is sitting in his assigned seat and has begun writing the answers. I open the test paper and I am taken aback. What’s this? But this is the history paper and I had come prepared for English! What will I do now? You can’t imagine how terrified I felt. And just then I would wake up and realise it was only a dream.

During Durga-puja I had once gone to my uncle’s house (Patgram Niyogi House). I loved wandering through the fields of the village. Good riddance to books! In the evening, incandescent gas lamps were lit in the outer and inner courtyards. The children went wild with joy but then all of a sudden the thought would cross our minds: “Oh Lord! Our annual exams will start just after the puja!” And in a second our joy would just evaporate! It was really dreadful! What kind of a life was this? There was no running away from exams.

I turned to the Mother and said:

“No, Mother! How can anyone pass? Impossible! Nobody can pass such tests! It is not easy to pass tests every second.”

The Mother laughed:

“There are many who do it. They pass these tests of every moment. Especially in the world outside there are many who do it quite easily.”

I kept looking at the Mother in disbelief. I somehow was not convinced by what She said. I told Her:

“Perhaps, Mother, some can do it in the world outside but here in the Ashram nobody can.”

When I kept repeating this, the Mother replied:

“In the Ashram there are also many who go through these tests at every moment successfully. There are five or six who pass them wonderfully.”

I could not say anything more. I just stood silently leaning against the wall and the whole of life appeared to me like a huge riddle.

Every day at the end of the class the Mother would stretch

Her arms and tell me: “Can you lift me up?”

And an impish smile would light up Her face. I would get very nervous being unable to lift Her up.

Then the Mother said:

“Now you sit and just see how I make you stand up.”

So I had to sit down. On the floor, naturally. With just one jerk the Mother raised me up on my feet. And then how She laughed! She looked like a beautiful young girl. I just could not feel at ease and was always a little uncomfortable. I would hear the Mother’s laughter echo within me all day.

A few days later another girl called Minu was allowed to join this class. So we were then two to study with the Mother. And She would recount to us stories and tell us so many things. We would just keep staring at Her to our heart’s content. As soon as the class was over the Mother stretched Her arms in front and said to me:

“Lift me up now.”

And much as I tried to pull Her by the arms I just could not move Her. I would break out in a sweat out of shame and embarrassment. It was just impossible for me to lift Her out of the chair.

The Mother would then laugh a lot, enjoying the spectacle. That open-hearted laughter-filled face of the Mother appears before my eyes even today. Then it was Minu’s turn. She would ask Minu:

“Now let me see if you can pull me out of my chair.”

And Minu would succeed in pulling Her out of the chair with her two arms. And the Mother exclaimed gleefully:

“Ah! You are strong!”

And putting Her arms on our shoulders She would start walking again. Then She went into Her room and selected different types of flowers to give us. She would look at our faces for some time and say:

“I would sketch your faces if I had time.”

And She kept standing at the open door and watched us go down the staircase. We would go down a few steps and then turn around to look at Her one more time. She would then wave “Au revoir” and close the door.

One day at the end of the Mother’s class when She was walking out into the front room, one of Her attendants started groaning in pain from a headache. Hearing her groan like that in front of the Mother I became a little nervous. The Mother suddenly turned very solemn and looking at us declared:

“Only sincerity touches me.”

We just stiffened with fear hearing these words from the Mother. My God! What power there was in that voice! Who would have said that just a few moments earlier the Mother had been heartily laughing and talking with both of us? How She used to overwhelm us with Her interesting, amusing stories! This change of the Mother’s face from moment to moment would never cease to amaze us but we never managed to understand the mystery.