Rain fell in a steady drizzle. The trees and the hills beyond were the colour of moss—dark and ancient. Some old memories stirred. Of dark monsoons days in my childhood when rain fell incessantly and steadily, turning everything wet, silent, and gloomy. Of days of our ancient ancestors when rain rejuvenated the Earth for life to flourish. A pair of lapwing stood guard on top of the asbestos roof that covered the neighbor’s terrace shrieking their heads off whenever a myna or a bulbul came too close. I wondered if they had nested on top of the roof instead of in the fields. They did not, however, shoo the pigeons away who sat along with them in the rain.
The bulbul parents were oblivious to all the shrieking around them. They would just hop in and out grabbing at small bites here and there as the little one fluttered around. I realized that they were not feeding the chick; instead they were teaching the young one the tricks of their trade and how to be smart about reaching to the food. Once in a while, a grey pied myna would fly and disappear into one of the many holes in the dead tree that was still standing next to the gate. It seemed like a magic show—a fleck of grey disappearing and reappearing in the greyness of the clouds and the dead bark. While the rain kept the humans indoor, it brought a shy and introverted black and brown coucal out of its hiding to forage right in the middle of the puddled streets.
The rain had slowed down and thin clouds fleeted in and out of the distant hills. Water dripped from the huge tree in front of the house. A rain-drenched hush fell as dusk approached. The sound of crickets and other insects grew louder. A pair of owls hooted from top of the dead tree. Bats, replacing the black kites of day time, soared across the dark sky. And late at night when most of the houses had switched off their lights and its inhabitants fallen asleep, a few fireflies showed up in the big tree dancing away in the wet night.
Krishnamurti copycat
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