Towards an Unknown Horizon

The environment was tranquil. Occasionally; long thunders broke the otherwise dead quietness. The darkness was ruling the night. Nothing was visible, except a dim flickering candle light seemingly dying out at times that faintly gleamed the two blurred images at the middle of the room.
Their pale faces, as dim as the candle light, were turning towards their child who was lying on the floor- colorless, motionless and breathless. Their insipid eyes were gazing at those closed eyes which were once such vivid and vibrant.
Their life had been a whirlpool. Due to the array of sufferings, they were frazzled and had no vigor, and so; both of them remained silent for a long time. Then ultimately, she uttered in a slow, weedy and exasperated voice;
“What-shall-we-… ….”

It was just a long stammer which remained incomplete. And so, he tried to persuade her, but he could just whimper. No words just the sound, but also it was a language- sound in deep panic. Instead both started crying. Their sober was somber. They caught hold of their hands, hugged each other, kissed frailly and tried to stop their crying, but still their rolling tears were automatic and the whimper was autonomous. It seemed their eyes were to cry, and their heart was to tolerate.

After a long time the male voice came out. It was the voice of defeat and frustration but still was rigid and firm.
“Let us suicide.”

The words sounded monotonous. His expression was blank and so was of her. They remained silent, even without looking at each other, quite for a while.
.
Probably she was not surprised of saying him that because she might as well have thought of that. There was no option behind as they had nothing left to be alive for.

They were poor but they were not born poor. Every human is born equal. It was the people who made them poor. And it was the people who called them poor.

Since his great grandparent who had been working in the masters’ field, he was following that, but still the principle that his generation owed to the master’s had doubled. May be at the time of his grandson it would be four times. Their generation would be slave forever. No one will come to ask about their pathetic condition. This was the main reason he wanted to suicide. He could bear another child. But the child will again have the same life of the slave, he thought.
Then suddenly it started raining. For a while they were safe, but soon, the rain started pouring over them through the roof of the grass. Both of them were soaked. Meanwhile, a gust of wind through the open window blew the candle off leaving the pitch darkness in the room too. As the dark room, their fate had been black.
Their dream had been shattered and their joy of living been vanished after their son, the only source of joy, had died the day before. For them, it was the end of everything. Sorrow! They never even knew that their son was suffering from pneumonia.

What a grief! Some children are grown without a scratch in their body and some die of a simple disease, in lack of a little money to go to the hospital. Some one has to starve doing so much toil while the other, from the same human race, has ill digestion of overeating without any work

It was midnight when they suddenly heard the jet thriving over to the sky. Their mind was on the aeroplane till they could hear any sound or even imagine any sound that might have been coming from the aeroplane. They had been living in a dream world to see their son fly an aeroplane. He had an ambition to be a pilot too. But flying the aeroplane was not in their half. It was the part of the people far off. Their right was just to look at it fly over their own village.

.

He thought quite for a while, came out of his hut and viewed the similar huts up to the horizon. The villagers and their hard work and starvation were apparent in his eyes. He also remembered the crowded dance restaurants and the bars of the city he had visited when he had gone in search of a job some months ago to earn the money for his sons’ studies.

He thought deeply once and again.

The rain had intensified. But he started feeling hot. He felt as if a flame of fire had burnt in his heart. Then slowly it leapt as an inferno all around. His body trembled with fear and anger. The furiosity shattered the fear. No more fear! He rushed inside the hut and returned with two huge knives. He fiercely stood just infront of his wife. She was frightened seeing him. He was so vigorous for the first time in his life.

He started, “Sampada! If you like you can follow me and if you don’t like you can stay here. But I am going to fight. I have declared the war with them. I cannot see you and the villagers like this. I can tolerate everything for me but I can’t see it anymore. I can’t tolerate it no more.”

Not even a tinge of reluctance could be seen in her eyes. Her eyes too were filled with the revenge of the injustice and discrimination. Her eyes were gleaming brightly and fearlessly like that of a tigress.

The rain had stopped, by the time when he was standing in a platform under the tree. Then, he shouted at the top of his voice,
“Listen everybody, listen.! Listen…”

Within a while, all the villagers were all around. They were quite astonished seeing such an inconspicuous creature revolutionized to such a horrible one.

“I don’t know no speech.”

He was silent for a while

“Have you seen how people live? What do they eat there? What type of house they have? No you haven’t. And look we work for them and we never get to feed our children properly. Leave to feed ourselves!”

Pointing to the people he started again, “has your child gone to school? And yours, and yours? None’s. And that’s how we too hadn’t and so will be to your offspring. How will they be a person that you dream them to be?

It’s because of our own fault. We never raised any voice against the people who deceived us. We were fearful. Now I declare the land that we are doing since decades is ours! We have no more loans to be paid! We owe no one. We will fight against whoever will come.”

Everyone shouted in the voice of approval.

But all of a sudden there was a silence when a small-pitched gentle voice came out from the middle. He was one of the teachers of the only school in that area. Although he was not from the same village, everyone’s eyes were filled with dignity and respect towards him. People are not respected from their origination or race but their behavior and morale.

“No one has ever won with the weapons in their hand”, said he. “It is the cause of destruction not a construction. Just the destruction! We no more want destruction because we are not inhumane like them and because we know what destruction is. We have real humane. We will displace them not with the weapons savagely but with our rights morale. Not with the arms but with the voice. We have got equal right. We can make it happen. What we need is a unity.”

He continued as a declaration, “and if you abandon that knife I am ready to fight together with you and for us.”

Everybody was silent.