A little late for this, probably should have posted around mid-February but I still have time till Holi so here goes! Everything is yellow and the fiery red of palash (though in our cities you see a lot more gulmohur and the occasional silk-cotton tree).

पीली पीली सरसों फूल  (Yellow are the mustard flowers)
पीली उड़े पतंग (The flying kite is yellow)
ओ पीली पीली उड़ी चुनरिया (The chunariya that flies is yellow)
ओ पीली पगड़ी के संग  (along with the yellow turban)
– opening lines of the spring/basant song from Upkar.

Vasant Panchami or the beginning of the spring season is on the 5th day of the waxing moon of Magh i.e. 12 February 2016 and is celebrated in the Northern part of India.

The colour yellow is associated with the day, be it clothes or rice coloured with saffron.

Also the day for worshipping Saraswati in some parts of the country e.g. Bengal. And in days past the day for a festival in honour of Kamadeva aka the God of Love, though the celebration shifted with time from April to the beginning of spring and is no longer celebrated.

Painting credit: Samar Ghose via Satyasri Ukil Barishkar.

PS: Obviously I love spring posts.

Spring arrives in the month of Phalgun, accompanied by honey-makers, and passes through green bamboo groves where the southerly wind blows.

Song of the Seasons, Fireflies in the Mist,  Qurratulain Hyder.

Painting: Sonali Mohanty.

She herself turned to be a bouquet of Palash
When she presented me with one
While within the green foliage her heart
tense with passion trembled in silent whispers
concerting to the warm south breeze.
That was the first Falgun  [X]

Lovers, Sudhir Khastgir (1946)