Monsoon – the season of love

In the temperate latitudes, the seasons are creatures of astronomy: does the hemisphere point towards the sun or away? In the tropics it is different; circulation in the atmosphere create the seasons. Just now over the Indian peninsula the monsoon winds are chasing away the heat of summer.

Kashchitkantavirahaguruna svadhikaratpramattaha
Shapenastangamitamahima varshabhogyena bhartuhu
yakshachakre janakatanayasnanapunyodakeshu
snighdhacchayatarushu vasati ramagiryashrameshu

Opening stanza of Meghdoot by Kalidasa (5th century CE)

A year from amorousness: it passes slowly.
So thought a Yaksha by his master sent,
For scanting duty, to the Ramagiry:
To mope in penance groves as banishment
By rivers Sítá’s bathing there made holy.

Translation by John Holcombe

Here, in Mumbai, during the first monsoon rain I spotted a young couple walking along the sea wall on Marine Drive. Classical Sanskrit poetry associates the monsoon with love (sringara ras). I had to take this seasonally appropriate photo as my taxi sped by.

I fumbled with my phone and nearly lost it in the tailwind of the taxi, but I got the shot. The grey monsoon clouds hide the sea; the road is slick with rain, and a young couple walk along the sea wall, wrapped in the weather, lost to the world. About two millennia ago, poets were writing about such couples.