My Subtle Neighbours

Decades ago, where our city house now stands, there used to be thriving paddy fields. Until a few weeks ago, our house overlooked an untouched housing plot that’d been left alone for years, like a small jungle. This place, untouched by its owner or a weed cutter in years, had become overgrown, almost capable of hiding an elephant! We would often spot mongooses sunbathing on the driveway and hear the call of a cuckoo bird. During COVID times, I have seen a peacock silently exploring the place in the evenings.

Despite sighting a cobra a few years ago, which forest officials relocated to a proper jungle, we never asked the owner to clear the overgrowth. Some time ago, a whirlwind uprooted a young teak tree, knocking it onto the electric lines and breaking a utility pole. Despite these incidents, we cherished the greenery. It was a rare sight—a miniature oxygen factory for city dwellers.

As shrubs turned into woody plants, their branches stretched to the electric lines, making clearing the area necessary. After multiple requests, the plot owner agreed, and an earthmover was brought in. On a sunny morning, the JCB machine began to pull out the sprawling shrubs on its way to clear the land. Out of nowhere, a group of crows landed on the compound wall, cawing loudly. Soon, a cuckoo joined, not singing its usual tune. The birds seemed to protest the destruction of their habitat.

Amid the clearing, I noticed a sparrow foraging behind the earthmover when a bandicoot emerged from an exposed hole and chased it into the air. A scorpion holding an insect in its mouth emerged from the ground and crawled its way onto the asphalted driveway. In less than two hours, the earthmover finished its task, piling the cleared debris in a corner. The once-green biomass now looked like a funeral pyre. The crows were still on the wall, silent now as if mourning a dear one’s passing. The cuckoo glided around the area, as if seeking hidden secrets. I wondered if it had left its egg in a host’s nest, hoping for a future.

The cleared land, dry and lifeless, looked like a cremation ground. An earthworm moved sluggishly towards death, and a colony of ants carried a dead earthworm to their nest for their evening feast. Moths swirled above the debris pile, as though chanting a requiem. Did they mourn for those pupae trapped in cocoons, unable to save themselves?

Stray dogs that usually sheltered in the bushes to beat the heat barked for a while before standing in awe for a few seconds in front of a moving stone, a turtle having swiftly retracted its limbs and head into its shell, and leaping over the wall in search of an alternate place to escape the sweltering heat.

As the sun dipped, casting an amber glow, I felt a profound grief lingering within me. I was awestruck by the previously hidden world of birds and creatures that had silently thrived across our house, now revealing their secrets. By clearing the shrubs, have we not rendered our fellow beings homeless and destitute?

Just when the stillness felt unending, a melodious note broke the air—the singing of the cuckoo perched on a coconut tree. Its fading song promised reunion after the downpour, a reminder that nature’s stories never truly end.