Fire-flies and Idea Illumination

Certain memories linger, strangely in ones memory. Such memories might be momentous, or monotonous. Yet they flare-up jewel-bright and come alive when others fade away into oblivion. Time in passing, only, re-brightens them with added intensity.

A sunset view, a sudden glimpse of startling lovliness. The colour of of a dress. A fireplace in a house, a certain tune in your brain, a particular leaf-tip in an entire field. An obscure turning into a forest meadow-pasture, a chance remark, a favourite book. Or a face. Bring to your mind the intriguing term, "to sit for ideas."

A greatest-ever and timely truth came my way at a secluded tea-estate, quite without my bidding them. During a pitch-black night. The hour was past midnight as i shared the wonders with the night.Silence and the glitter of countless stars were my tutors. I stared into a parallel universe at the unfolding magic. With child-like joy i drank in the ethereal mysteries all around.It had been a day of intense labour and vexations at the factory, and i was dog-tired. I had come to the end of my tether. There suddenly, right before me, fire-flies had set a silver-oak a-fire. I watched, trans-fixed their intermittent phosphorescent, bluish-green, glow. Flickering and pulsing a strong light. One that vanishes as suddenly. But re-appears. The glittering gyrations, are in fact, their communication bond. The self-glow follows a sequence, flash-pulse and preference all their own. Morse Code i imagined. Their pyrotechnics and sparkling dazzle left me half-awed. Prehistoric secrets they are at-one-ment with. A million more, than i, will ever glean.I sat spellbound against the gnarled trunk of a lone silver oak, to behold the all-beautiful spound and light spectacle till day break.Even as the first rays of a full-orbed sun hit the dawn-flushed mountain-range, they had vanished. Back to the Source from where they came. The roughness and pressures of my day evaporated, as if on their own. I witness a softness of being wrapped in karakul lamb's-wool.

I felt new life-breath surge secretly into my soul. I was stationed on this desolate, brooding, derelict factory. Great pressures weighted on me in a gripping G-force way.the secret dnace of the fire-flies cast an incomparable, unparalleld spell. Nature-worship reveals secrets equal to ones present-moment need.Those teeney-weeney jewel-bright friends, gradually brought me back to my senses. It was the coal-black dark that made them glitter all all the more. A shimmering bed of diamonds. That was it. This creatures celestial lantern-producing radiance remains altogether hidden, its neon-pulsing, in-born prowess weakened during the day light hour. The dark-adoring fire-flies were born to spread the light-essence. As the treetops lit up in a sheet of white flame i deciphered a message, relevant, and pulsed just for me:"Cyrus, when it becomes completely dark and storm clouded, clap your hands with gratitude and look yet, deeper, within. Especially, during your trying hour do bright-winged in-sights self-appear. The darker your night of the soul, the more dazling and self-luminous becomes your star."The scene connected powerfully, and meaningfully with my survival during the 9-months of my mission there.

Nothing is hidden. Succour arrives, often, when one least expects. The fire-flies were heraldic for me. Their silence, spoke tomes. As the wind howled through a sea of tea-bushes, a deep warmth spread evenly through my subtler being. Flooded me with a secret power. One, transmitted by those fire-flies. Later, when ever they appeared, no sooner that i approached too close they'd vanish. Yet, if i remained motionless, absolutely stock-still stock merging my breath into an at-one-ment with the sighing breeze, then of their own, slowly at first; gradually in bolder numbers the heaven-sent visitors always returned. It is the same with your ideas and cherished spiritual everyday insights. Be super-patient. Become stock-still, inwardly. Like fire-flies, your self-illuminating ideas remain, momentarily, half-hidden. Just out of view. They must inevitably re-return. With their reassuring self-luminescence. Follow them with a stout heart.

Certain Cuban tribes secure a Brightest-glowing "Kukyo" fire-fly to their big-toe. The resultant steady cone of bluish-green light casts a blessing-bringing cone through the dark and brooding forest. Taking them directly to their destinations.

Have you set found and set free your own secret inward-dwelling fire-fly?

During a moon-less drive I once wished to catch one of these utterly curious night-adoring creatures. I imagined them to be of iridescent arresting neon rainbow-attired hues. Even as i was musing, a lone fire-fly, tuned-in to my secret musings and of its own flew in mysteriously through my cars open window. In a sense it flew into an open glade in my own mind. As i held the teeney-weeney fly, i was stunned to see how ordinary-looking and outwardly-drab it appeared.

But thats just it. The universe has creatures no less mystery-filled, and they come in an outwardly-appearing plain look. Litte, wonder each of us need to first fathom our own in-most depths, first, to sense the after-glow. Have you not thought of those bravest miners who travel to the earths dar core? Are they not the ones who re-emerge with the light of true appreciation and self-aware-ness?

Cyrus Jehangir Sataravalla