Hope and the Peacock

There is definitely something charismatic; something numinous and charismatic about peacocks. In this discourse, I shall take you through a semi-dark passage in my mind, a carefully preserved and commonly restricted passage that leads to my fascination for peacocks.
It’s a beginning for my own realization while coming to say that peacocks are my idols of Romanticism. Romanticism here is not the virtue of being aesthetically or tastefully romantic, it is the derived connotation for optimism, the idealism in being frivolously, mindlessly optimistic.

The last time I saw a peacock was after the last time I brushed my teeth – this morning. A damp morning it was, probably due to a minor squabble among the pregnant clouds above (the squabble couldn’t have been more pleasant for the humans below). I live in this bungalow, in the centre of a dense, unkempt urban forest, in the outskirts of Tuticorin some ten miles from the Tuticorin port. Along with me, in the expanse of the bungalow, live a dozen frogs with a great family of whiskery grandfathers and sashaying tadpoles, a couple of sleepy, drunk water snakes, a five hundred scurrying squirrels, and hold your breath, a peahen and a peacock. On the first day of my stay here, I didn’t realize the existence of the last two inmates in my compound; I was head-punched and slept like a log that day. But some time around midnight, on the second night of my stay, I woke up with a start. There was a warping sound emanating from outside my window and it was tearing my ear membranes apart. It was certainly some animal, I decided. I first thought it was a rattlesnake (not a far-fetched thought – very possible), or maybe just a crow with insomnia. In my groggy state, I was just plain confused and little freaked out too (I have whatever ego it takes to not admit that I was frightened). Before I could get myself to summon the security guard stationed outside (who was most probably boozed up and knocked out), the sound stopped. I pulled the fattest pillow close to my chest and buried my face into a dream that revolved around boarding into a train and boarding out of a ship. That following morning, I witnessed one of the most beautiful sights ever. With the sun and the vast blue-gray skies as a perfect backdrop, a peacock was perched on the terrace, with all its glory, grace and cosmic glimmer unfurled for me to see. On a later enquiry with the security guard that morning, I came to know the identity of my midnight’s visitors. They were none other than this peacock and his benevolent wife, both in a particularly barmy mood.

To a Buddhist, the peacock symbolizes purity. But to me, the peacock symbolizes optimism – Unrestrained enthusiasm, limitless hope and inexhaustible euphoria – all comprised within that single expression. A couple of days ago I found a peacock feather lodged royally in between two shrubs. I picked it up, went back to my room and placed it near the mirror. I looked at its reflection for a long time. I have heard from my mother about how she, when she was a child herself, had stolen the peacock feathers kept for puritan purposes at home, and with so much of implicit belief and hope, had hid them in between her school textbooks. According to the child in her, the peacock feathers defied the science of reproduction and could multiply if cushioned between the pages of a book. I remember laughing at her and calling her a dreamy kid, with all the maturity my voice could command. I looked at the rich, indifferent splash of colours on the peacock’s feather placed before the mirror. For a moment, I was tempted to usher the feather inside the folds of my “Company Accounts” textbook. After that moment passed, I laughed at myself for laughing at my mother the other day. Even though what she did as a child was puerile, what it now conveyed to me is the amount of hope that little feather had exuded to her.

A peacock’s mood is on a song if it spreads its Resplendence for the world to see. This is the connection I see in peacocks radiating happiness and optimism to its audience. When you look at a beautiful woman tremendously happy and chatty, you tend to get blissful and hopeful yourself. This is the logic I see here too, and in this case it is a beautiful peacock.

I think I can sit hours together and marvel the artist in God, or whatever you choose to call that Anonymous Creator. I shall now go back to stare at the feather. Let me place it between the pages of a book. I hope it soon reproduces. Rest assured, I shall send word when it does.