55 (the noonday air is quivering)

THE NOONDAY air is quivering, like gauzy wings of a dragon-fly. Roofs of the village huts brood birdlike over the drowsy households, while a Kokil sings unseen from its leafy loneliness.

The fresh liquid notes drop upon the tuneless toil of the human crowd, adding music to lovers' whispers, to mothers' kisses, to children's laughter. They flow over our thoughts, like a stream over pebbles, rounding them in beauty every unconscious moment.