Nothing was the same after the evil of death loomed large over every house. Everyone had the same harrowed look on their face. Modesty was no longer an ordinance; women constantly held a cloth to their mouth either to weep or to escape the unbearable stench of battered corpses. The loose end of their sarees hung limply leaving their chest exposed as they heaved heavily between screams and pitiful cries as they mourned their families. Men, women and children were carried in thick chadars made of layered cloth and taken to marriage halls, libraries and courts- any place with a pukka roof and empty space- and laid out to be administered feeble treatment before they were engulfed in death's slow embrace. 2000 turned to 800 very quickly and then it was just the few families that refused to desert the land that their ancestors had lawfully handed them. Coconuts lay fallen in abundance and the lone crop that refused to die stood resolutely still, as if movement alone would invite destruction.

 

A little while ago when the crops for the next season were being sown, the farm folk sat together and debated what they would do about the weed that was growing vigorously- stalk, shoot with a long unending root. The farms were lush green back then and the air moved differently. The village was small and jejune with courtyards made of cow dung and roofs made of dried hay. Women squatted outside their homes with pots of water, rinsing plates or washing their clothes. The only time a dhurry was used was when it was unfurled at night. All that changed when the illness crept into the village. Like a weed that is only a peculiar looking crop till it wages war with the land, the plague came in disguise and managed to uproot the very beings who nursed the soil.