The Everlasting Bloom
5 May
A tree that blooms forever? It sounds like one of Aesop’s fables, or a biblical parable: a tree that boasted its beautiful and fragrant flowers daily; the gods grew jealous and smote the vainglorious tree.
Or a tragic poem: “a tree that bloom’d forever/sadly, rested it did, never.”
My housemates and I hosted a big party last weekend; sort of a farewell party as I leave this wonderful community I’ve found here in San Francisco. More than fifty people came. My yoga teacher and class assistants presented me with a stupefyingly large bouquet of pink lilies. These flowers have filled my room with such a pleasant aroma, and I find myself staring at the petals, wondering how there could be so many at once, how they could release such fragrance, reveling in the beauty of the collected specimen of Lilium.
And it brings me back to the memory of the awesome Araliya tree in Sri Lanka.
During the first two months that I stayed with Nerissa and David at Pointe Sud, I’d come to the beautiful dinner table every night and find dozens of white flowers scattered on top of it, arranged in interesting patterns. Sometimes it was arranged in the shape of Sri Lanka. Other times it was tucked into napkins or floated on water in small cups. There was one night where Asanka and Siri went overboard and took a trunk from a banana plant, inserted candles in its various parts, and sprinkled Araliya petals all over. The effect was stunning.
After several days of seeing fresh white flowers everywhere in the house morning, afternoon, and night, I asked David where all these flowers came from.
“From that tree right outside.”
He led me to the Araliya tree near the fountain. A delightful specimen of Plumeria obtusa!
“Nihal and Gamini have to rake up all those flowers off the ground three times a day. That’s where all those white flowers come from.”
I asked him when was this tree’s flowering season.
“There isn’t one; it just blooms every day, forever.”
During my stay in Sri Lanka, I slowly realized that this wasn’t such an unique phenomenon in the country. I should have take note of how the children always had tiny purple, pink, and yellow flowers ready to offer to Lord Buddha every morning and night. They just pick them off the bushes around the edges of the school. But I didn’t notice, not for a long time until it all struck me one day–everything here blooms forever.
I remember a line from Anil’s Ghost by Michael Ondaatje. It went something like this: “Spit on the dirt in Sri Lanka, and a bush will suddenly spring up.” Ceylon is in the tropics; perpetual lushness is everywhere.
But the Araliya tree at Pointe Sud was always my favorite. Dependable and charitable, it was happy to just receive its water from the sky and burst forth flowers all day, year round. How magical. I look forward to returning to that tree soon.
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