Our Land

“Omens are good. We’ll have a good harvest this season darling”, my wife said to me when I entered the house after a hard day’s work. The rice had been planted and now we waited for the rains to grace the earth from the heavens. I had some money left over from selling a few fruits. I gave it to her for safe keeping.
“Use it well. This should last us for some time. If God’s grace is there, then the omens shall be true. We can only pray now”, I replied as I washed for dinner. She had prepared some spicy curry and I had that with chapatti I had leftover from lunch.
Right from the first rays, the sun baked the soil in its ferocity the first few days. Then the rains came. We were happy. The omens were becoming true. The crops were beginning to grow. Our joys knew no bounds. They soon turned to tears as the rains didn’t let up. In my dreams, I saw our crops getting washed away.
“Lord, be merciful. Our livelihood is in your hands”, I uttered, praying for mercy. Yet it didn’t seem to stop. Taking a shovel, I went out in the rain and began making trenches to drain the excess water. As I worked, I slipped and fell. She rushed out to help me up. “Another omen… the way of nature can’t be messed with. It’ll take its own paths”, she said.
Another day and the rains began to recede. The sun began to shine and a rainbow appeared in the sky. A few patches had been lost, but most had survived. A good harvest on the whole. Many of my neighbors had their entire crop washed out. I made a lot of money in the market that day.
“Now we’ll share our grace with our neighbors. It is God’s will. We don’t need so much wealth, we can afford to give”, I said. My wife smiled. She agreed. We gave a bit of our profits to our neighbors who smiled at our generosity. Rain began to slowly fall again. “This rain is tears of joy from the heavens above”, she said.
Dancing to the breeze, the leaves began to fall on the next day. Autumn had arrived, brining with it Thanksgiving. As we sat down to our modest meal, she said grace. “This day, we thank the Lord Almighty for blessing us with this wonderful food, a good harvest and giving this life to us. We realize that nature has its own voice which can’t be shouted down. Thank you for blessing our land, which gives us our livelihood. Thank you for every moment of joy and sorrow. Amen”

Poetry & writing are to me, a breath of fresh air in a life that is sometimes covered by the smoke of sorrow or self doubt. They also become the sweets I share to celebrate when life offers me a reason to. But most of all, they are to me, my life. For each word I write is a piece of my heart, a thought that just had to find its way into the world.

6 thoughts on “Our Land”

  5. Beautiful story, and something all should think about — when you have enough, instead of hoarding it, share it with family, after all, familes are neighbors too.

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