Weeds

I am dreaming of my family encased in my cage. The walls are hard and inconvenient and so is my bed. In the past, I have tossed and turned ofttimes to find a comfortable spot in this cage, but it’s been always the same. So, I try and dream to numb my pain and lull myself to sleep again. I close my eyes and see my jade son and olive daughter, their faces screwed up and their lips upturned as their sweet shrill cries reach my ears. They blink under the sun, dazed by light and air. Their mother is cooing and singing in her melodious voice and soothing them from their distress. They listen to her—eyes round and wide as they reach out for her lime green tendrils enchanted under her spell. I tickle my daughter to welcome her to life, to reassure her that earth, light, air and rain are all pure and divine; she turns her head and giggles and then leans onto me as if she knows her papa.

After a month and ten days’ time we chat in merry pin, my son says in an excited voice’ Papa, look at that ball in the sky. It’s so round and has silver light.’

‘Yes my son, it’s a wraith silver disc, ofttimes a mount or a slender crescent ‘C’ hanging bright in the inky sky. You will find her wander along from east to west on different days.’

My daughter claps and shakes her hips, singing shrilly in the still night air’ It’s like magic papa, it’s magic.’ Jade and olive hold onto each other and sway away in the cool night air.

Oftentimes, my wife and I, band backwards and forwards like shields and shades till they reach their age and start to bloom after the rain washed days. Our offspring have been gifted with our genes; we smile as their buds blooms slowly and materialize as small dot shaped flora. Their many tiny white-haired appendages stick out from their cores; a snowball replacing their buds. Our neighbor mates of the moor congratulate us on our happy day. We are happy in their progress but a green teethed monster has forever lingered there, deep in our hearts. Their vicious green teeth sunk deep— feeding on happiness, filling us with trepidation. We fear the brutal and vicious truth. We fear the loss of our son, our daughter, our mates and our entire race. Worse still, we fear of the pain and neglect that we must face if we are destined to live.

 I turn and toss in my sleep fearing the day we taste bigotry again.

We share our fear with our neighbors. ‘What will be when they tread on us, hasty for their breads and busy in rat’s race? Or worse still unweed us to beautify their place and throw us out in a moldy dark drain?’ My wife is daunted by the straight limed race and their unforgiving ways. She voices her fears timidly to our mates.

My best mate angered by that race swears in a booming tone’ Come that day and I shall protect your tiny buds with my round weapons and sticky nodes, and if I were to die in that fight, I shall know that I have done so for a virtuous cause.’

My chest puffed out I say to my mates’ I have been blessed with the best men of the land. We all shall clump to save our lineage.’ And so we sway forward in unison to hug our mates.

 I mutter in my sleep as I know the inevitable end and still, I know not!

On a chilly night, a silhouetted shade blocks out the moon's rays. So, we look up, a puffed straight-limbed man have come to our place and is walking about the abandoned land. A twig cracks and leaves from last autumn crunch under his monstrous boots, breaking the silence of the moor. We stick together, ready to strike and catch him off guard. But the flashlight simply surveys the space from a distant place and then off he goes on his way. My wife is sick with worry and age but still she stands tall in her place always guarding our children from evil eyes.

A fortnight goes by but neither the puffed men nor his flash does come to our place, so we relax our stance and dance and sway in the rain. My wife is merry and so is my olive and jade with identical grins on their faces. On full moon nights, the moon shines and radiates moonbeam, bathing us in its magical light and so we do a special tap dance for such glorious days.

A year goes by smooth as silk with no man treading past our place.

Then on a chilly dawn the puffed man returns, not in boots or fancy shoes but barefoot with shovels and spades. He digs the front with his strong limbs and spades. We shiver in fear as the tools are sharp and cuts through earth. Shall we be able to defeat such razor sharp foes? But the man digs some holes and plants saplings, though taller than us and not of our race. At dusk, he takes away the shovels and spades after watering our towering mates. A few drops fall in our place and we are ecstatic of our faith. The man comes by and waters the land till the towering mates grow taller and taller and we are covered under their shade. We now neither see the sun at dawn nor the stars at night and the distant memory of the divine moon is an unforgettable sovereign.

But we are alive! We console our children and our mates alike. On some days our life is crueler than death. Children with wobbly knees step on us to collect the yellow fleshy things, and at times the puffed men with boots run after them with a stick.When the days are dark and rainy, the lovebirds sneak in shiny shoes and stilettos and collects red roses to declare love to their mates. We wish we were marigolds or a huge jack-fruit tree, because though their fruits are sometimes taken by force they are loved and don't have to see the undersides of soles.

We live our life in this state, till the day a lady comes to visit the place. She caresses the lilies and the marigolds and breaths in the sweet smelling rose and steps on us while she takes a tour. An old man is wobbling in her wake as the puffed man joins her under the shade.

‘I love this place’ the lady tells the man’ but we will need to unweed this place, than we can build a home of our own.’

The man nodes and declares’ Whatever you say love, Rahul this place should be clean when we come next.’

We are uprooted and thrown in a dark lake though we put up a good fight and redden the old man's hands. Some of us were seeding, able to preserve ourselves. It's a tough cage. I know not what happened to my wife and my jade and olive.

Crunch!!Something sharp cracks my cage and I am free again to grow and stretch. I grow fast in a barren place without love or care from the straight limbed race. The only things that care for us are the divine earth, light, rain and air. We are all the children of nature and she loves us all. I make new mates who were born out of that single crunch. Though we laugh and enjoy like the good old days, often either a man or a monkey steps on their ways and waters and caresses the roses and the marigolds that grows in vessels.