Sahyadrica

The Bumbun hide overlooks a small man-made meadow with two trees at its centre, encircled by a wall of tropical wood and foliage. This brown moss-and-fallen-leaves-covered hideout is a window to this little opening in the rainforest. The two central trees contain rope-tied salt bricks to attract animals into the meadow. At six o’clock in the morning everything is pitch dark. I peer into the darkness, my mind stuck on my colleague’s narration of a rendezvous with a lone elephant the morning before. He saw the tusker emerge from the wall, gripping at the tender grass blades as he made his way to the salt lick, took a few large chunks out of them, and disappeared into the wall. It has been nearly a decade since an elephant ventured by the Bumbun hide, we’re told. 6:36, 6:42, 6:53 at the Bumbun hide The sky gradually turned a soft blue. If there were a scale to measure the seamless and smooth transition between night and day, it would have to be called by a new name. The scale i...

In the wee hours does he wake daily,                weary and dazed – under woodsmoke haze To the eerie howls of jackals,                             he strolls And visits yonder fields of paddy,                      with a sickle in hand – frail and tanned To reap the crop ‘neath the hills of Maikal. Enshrined by the cragged silhouettes,               old and somber – by the flicker of ember Under darkest sky with a tinge of blue,              he feels His hands hack the wetted spikelets,                 cold and thin – cracks on skin As dawn breaks to clear the hue. The rustling ears fall to the moist earth,           every grain godsent – on a lifetime...