Four a.m. though it is not yet light, a lone bird has begun to sing outside our bedroom window, my ears harking to its piercing and melancholy three-note melody. I imagine it, body soft and round and warm, perched on a stout limb of the mahogany tree or on a delicate branch of the pliant bamboo. I picture in my mind the swell of its chest, its beak aimed heavenward, as it sings its song full-throated and unabashed.
My mind strays. I think of a story my father told me. Of the birds that he and his brothers, when they were young boys, would sometimes try to pick off with slingshots, the birds flitting in and out of the stands of acacia and mango trees that at that time shaded the property around the family compound. Of how they would then proffer their meager spoils to their grandmother, who would indulge them and cook the birds, tiny and bony though they were, and fry them to a flavorful crisp.
Like a bag of marbles
I think of this, and then again my mind veers off on different tangents. Thoughts skitter and collide in my head as if someone had let spill a bag of marbles in there. What to pack for an upcoming trip. Appointments to make, and keep. A rundown of things I need to tick off on a long to-do list.
I think of Michael Jackson and blissful, propofol-induced sleep. I think, Is insomnia a symptom of menopause? Mundane ruminations that clutter the mind and, also, some—stirrings of worry, intrusive and unwelcome, that encumber the heart.
So sleep remains stubbornly elusive, ungraspable as smoke, even as my eyes grow finally heavy.
For the past two-three hours, I have been turning this way and that in bed, pulling up the blankets and then tossing them aside, fluffing the pillows, careful not to wake the husband.
I try the age-old trick of counting sheep. Sheep jumping over fences—somehow, for me, that image hardly encourages repose, not with all that pumping adrenalin, all that bleating and endless leaping.
The Corpse Pose
And so after a while, I give up the effort and simply lie there, flat on my back, limbs stretched out, unmoving. And then, suddenly like an epiphany, a light of recognition flashes and my mind seizes on a word: Savasana. The Corpse Pose.
I am attending my first yoga class, in a yoga studio five floors up from the snarl of the rush-hour traffic. It reminds me of a sanctuary, a space hushed and softly lit, where an air of something like reverence permeates. A soothing place a world away from the blare of car horns and the breathless bustle happening just below.
Understandably, I had earlier been quite anxious, wondering if it was prudent of me, at my age, to subject my body to the rigors and contortions of yoga poses or asanas—not to mention, keep my balance and hold those poses—without injuring, or even embarrassing, myself. (And I am cautioned by the memory of my short-lived tennis lessons. Six in all, before I developed tennis elbow and had to stop.)
Open mind
Now, I have willed myself to shed whatever apprehensions I might have had at the door. Perhaps it helps that the teacher is an old schoolmate, making possible a comfortable and easy rapport as she welcomes me into the studio.
Perhaps it helps that I remember, as she had advised, “to come with an open mind.” No expectations, no fear. Perhaps it helps that I am looking to explore new things to keep myself occupied, eager to quell a sense of unease on account of life’s recent upheavals, small and otherwise, typical and not, that have left me feeling unmoored.
I step into the room where classes are held. Already, a number of students are waiting, sitting on mats lined neatly on the floor. All women, all younger than I (much younger, from the looks of them), all quiet and perfectly still in the Lotus Position.
Inconspicuous
I retrieve a mat from the storage chest and stash my bag behind a curtained enclosure for lockers, then go back to switch my cell phone to silent, extending, as well, silent apologies in my head to the class for the mild disturbance this was causing.
I find a spot at the back of the room, where I hope to be inconspicuous. I unroll my mat, settle into place, and after a few quick adjustments manage to do a…Half-Lotus. I am slightly taken aback. I had thought that the Lotus Position was all simply a matter of squatting Indian-style and pulling your feet up to rest on your thighs, right foot on left thigh, and left foot on right. Not rocket science, but not all that easy, either, I discover.
Without too much preamble, our teacher begins the class with breathing exercises, emphasizing that we must remember to “connect with our breath.” While initially my mind insists on drifting every which way (Is my mascara running? How am I going to get the water bottle in my bag? Why is it so hot? Does the husband know where I am?), slowly I begin to let go of distractions.
And so I determine to focus on my breathing, becoming fully aware of it. I strive to be in the present where no thoughts trespass, letting these thoughts be “as clouds that simply drift by.”
I bend and twist
Quietly, attentive as our teacher demonstrates, I submit myself to the challenge of the asanas: Sun Salutation, Downward-Facing Dog, Cobra, Tree Pose, Triangle Pose, among others; innocuous-sounding names, though I learn soon enough that some are quite strenuous, at least for me, to pull off.
With some years (and counting) of Pilates on my side, I find that I am able to execute some of the poses, even if, as expected of a newbie, the movements are not quite fluid or unhindered.
Gamely, I bend and twist and stretch the body as best I can, notwithstanding reluctant limbs that refuse to flex. I cannot do the Cobra, for some reason, and I flop on my tummy. But I am able to balance on one leg in the Tree Pose, remembering to engage the stomach to stabilize the core, wobble-free and straight and sturdy as a tree.
I follow instructions and perform a Shoulder Stand, and I am amazed at myself, no matter that it is a rather crooked and clumsy version of one.
And then, at the tail end of the sequence of asanas, after all the body’s exertions, we do a Savasana. We lie flat on our backs, heads centered on the mat; we let our arms fall to our sides, and spread out our legs. The lights switched way down low, we close our eyes and allow our bodies to become heavy, imagine them melting into the floor.
For a few minutes we stay motionless, like corpses, our ears attuned to the soft, lulling voice of our teacher who prompts us to envision a white light hovering over our bodies, slowly floating first over ankles, then legs, making its way up to our heads.
In my mind’s eye, the light pulses with a warm and subdued glow, and I let it linger over my heart and there, as our teacher intones, bring it stillness and calm.
We chant our Om’s, and the air seems to thrum with this mystic sound. We offer salutations of namaste, pressing our palms together and slightly bowing. “The divine in me salutes the divine in you.”
With that uplifting affirmation, the class draws to a close. The body is in a state of equilibrium; the heart, quiet, for now.