Essay on An Autobiography of a Bouquet

I am a beautiful bouquet of gladioli and, sometimes do wonder what is in store for me. My master made me with so much of love and hard work, picking all red gladioli, then, putting us all together, and then packing us neatly into one bouquet.

These days I am lying with my master together with several other of my brothers, other bouquets, some smaller, some bigger and, each one being made of a different variety of flowers, of different colors.

My life, like the life of all others of my clan is very short. We all stay in our master’s house at night and he carries us all to his shop in the morning and there we sit, and wait to be bought by any customer. My master’s shop is somewhere in Connaught Place, in a busy corner.

There he has a covered space with glass panes all around and, the space is also air conditioned – lest we dry up and die. The whole day we stay in this air- conditioned shop with our master all the while, listening to the busy buzz on the roads in front, and often we see a well nigh convergence of shoppers at my master’s shop.

The day is very interesting, so many noises all around, ever so many people and then, all of us friends of the flowers clan seated together, enjoying each other’s company. Every day people throng in large numbers at the shop and take flowers, single, or by count, or bouquets, depending on their requirements.

On hearing various conversations among people who stand in front of the shop, I have come to understand that, these days presentation of flowers and bouquets has become a fashion in the upper strata of society.

Whether it is a birthday, a marriage and any other celebration or even death we flowers are in much use. This is the reason we flowers have become a very important class, and have assumed a sort of sophistication.

I have been lying here for the last one week, and I do wonder when a customer will come to buy me, and take me out of this place of monotony. My only wish is that, my fate is attached to a birthday or a wedding or any such other happy occasion.

The very thought of my being placed on a dead body gives me the creeps. Oh! God, help me in finding place in a festive occasion and not be assigned a sad duty of being offered on a dead body.

The days have been passing by and many of my friends go out of this shop daily and I await my turn of being offered but I also continue to pray that I am used for a happy occasion.

I know that, after I leave my master’s place, there is not much more to look forward to. My buyer will offer me wherever I am destined to go and there, after a few hours I will dry up and die, and will then find my place in the dustbin. That has to be the end of all of my class. We bloom and look beautiful but, our lives are short.

We spread fragrance; we add to the beauty of the environment, we are used by man in several places, and on several occasions. As soon as we lose our utility, dry up and our beauty is destroyed we are heaped up in a dustbin of the Municipality and that is the end of all of us.

I am, presently, as I write this brief life sketch hearing a customer talking to my master and I think I will soon be purchased and then the cycle of action, being bought, being presented, and being thrown will follow. In the meantime readers, I request you all to pray to God that, my customer uses me for a happy occasion – and, as my heart beats fast, I pen off this little story of my life.