A Giant Knock At the Door

Dew drops

On the watchful leaves of the night

And the sleepy flowers

With their buds cuddled

Presented the promise of the day.

The night mail, few miles away from its destination

Went passing by, adding its warmth

To the early morning whispers

Inside the closed cottages.

The surrounding corn fields

Between the manioc plantations

And the banana trees with dense leaves

Provided the screening green

To the human habitats.

Somewhere in the corner of a cottage

A child with lazy eyes, still lying on the mat,

Felt the cracking of the dried palm leaves.

And then,

A giant knock at the door,

And the just-slanted wooden plank fell.

The clay wall beside thrashed,

And the thatched roof reached the ground

Landing on the entire family of farmers.

And the tusker's trunk was visible.

The wailing sounds of the neighbourhood,

The breezy silence of the morning

And the still brightening light of the dawn

Added to the helplessness.

Caught within the span of this lonely elephant,

The adrenaline flush failed to adhere the natural order,

And the reflexes refused to obey.

The human faculties froze

And the atmosphere was grey.

The first call for help came out

In the form of mother's death lullabies.

The only soul that began to cry out,

While the rest of the family of five

Breathed the silence under the fallen roof.

Saliva was flowing out of those motherly lips

While those words without clarity

Reached the boundaries of safety.

The tusker searched with care;

Searched for the source of this wailing.

The treble-piped song for refuge

From this motherly larynx

Caused the giant legs to step back.

The mighty strength of its trunk

Threw away the dried palmyra roof.

The more the tusker stepped back,

The more was the cry of death.

Doubts of the charge of this giant mammal.

With its trunk in a slow motion of a pendulum,

And its ears adding strength to the motion of the wind,

It decided to withdraw.

Sensing the human calamity around

The precious mammal vacated

Focussing its eyes straight into the nearby dense wilderness,

Through the harvested paddy fields,

Beyond the railway line.