Skip to main content

Michael and the Witch


Michael’s nights were haunted by the woods.  The woods were vanishing from real lands.  They were encroached upon by people who knew how to bribe elected leaders.  Thus residential apartments and health resorts replaced the woods.  Godmen and Ammas replaced the tree nymphs and the elves. 

The woods were lovely, dark and deep.  Michael had no promises to keep or miles to go before he could sleep.  In fact, sleep had deserted him.  Nymphs and elves haunted his nocturnal wakefulness.  The woods beckoned him.

Not all the forests were swallowed by human greed.  Michael lived at the edge of the greed.  His village was yet to be sold to builders and developers.  It would be sold soon, however.  An Adventure Park would replace the village. 

Michael drank the last bit of the distilled brew left in the bottle, mounted his cycle and went off whistling all the way to where the builders and bulldozers had not reached yet.  The moon was shining brightly in the midnight sky boosting the brewed intoxication in his veins.

He parked his cycle outside the huge wall of the last reach of development and walked into the woods.  A peacock shrieked a welcome.  You can experience life as a terror or you can experience it as a wonder, said the peacock.  Michael pinched himself. 

“Who are you?” Michael asked looking at the stooping old woman who appeared mysteriously in front of him.

“Viola, the witch,” she said with a grin that had no match with anything that Michael had seen hitherto.

“Why do you witches insist on looking so horrible?” asked Michael.

“If we don’t look horrible will we be witches?  Haven’t your poets and story tellers given us our shapes?”

“Can’t you change them?  I mean the shapes, not the poets and story tellers.”  Michael knew it was easier to convert rocks and monsters than poets and novelists. 

“How will you recognise us if we change shapes?”

“Try and see,” said Michael as if identity had nothing to do with appearances. 

“You are funny,” said the witch.

“OK, be my guest.  Smile a bit.”

The witch decided to cooperate.  But her smile was terribly warped.

Michael felt pity for her.  “You need my help, I think.”  He held her close to him and planted a very affectionate kiss on her lips.

“Hey!  What are you doing?  We are not characters in some fairy tale.  Do you think you’re some princely knight turning an ugly witch into a princess charming with a magical kiss?”

“You’re already looking better, you know!” exclaimed Michael. 

“True, I’m feeling better,” said the witch.

“So I’m your princely knight!”

“But I’m no princess charming.”  She shammed coyness.

“You’re still pretending, that’s why.”

“It takes time to change really.”

“Who’s asking you to change?”

“You!”

“I only told you to feel better.”

“Will you come tomorrow too?”

“If it will help you feel better, I will.  But eventually you won’t need me.  Why don’t you walk with me to the edge of the forest?  I have to go home now.”

And they walked.  Whistling mirthfully.  Talking like old friends who had met after a long time. 

“You know what?” said Viola when they reached the edge of the forest.  “I feel like leaving the forest and coming to live in the city.”

“Oh, no!”  Michael didn’t know what to say.  After the initial hesitation born of shock, he said, “When I entered this forest the peacock told me something.”

Viola waited to hear it.

“You can experience life as a terror or you can experience life as a wonder.”

Viola liked that.

“Good night.  Sweet dreams,” he planted another gentle kiss on her lips.

Violas was still wondering which to choose: terror or wonder.


Comments

  1. It is not easy to think differently from the masses, and choose a path rarely taken.
    Today the airport security asked me whether I fear facing the wild animals. I told him that I fear man more than any other animal. No one else is going to attack me without any reason.

    It is not easy to lift ourselves from the beliefs of the masses and question if someone is indeed a witch simply because of her looks. Perhaps it is not an easy question in an increasingly image conscious and selfie driven world. Whether it is a "terror or wonder", the underlying theme of your article is a thing to ponder.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Man is the most dangerous creature on the earth. Wonder has been rendered primitive. Modern man is left with the terror of his own making.

      Thanks for your contribution to the post.

      Delete
  2. In fact, the misery is choice. Choicelessness is bliss.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's why Walt Whitman said he wished to be an animal :)

      Delete
  3. Interesting Read.Modern man has to fear himself ,true. deep and intriguing ideas there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Perhaps, a bit too intriguing, Nima. I had expected more comments :)

      Delete
  4. I went through 3 stages while reading this: Interest, amusement, and thoughtful. I must repeat again if I have already said this: you should compile and publish these stories which are so relevant, full of wisdom yet simple, as a book.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Roohi, my greatest delight is to take my reader through those phases you mentioned. Nothing else means anything to me.

      Delete
  5. “If we don’t look horrible will we be witches? Haven’t your poets and story tellers given us our shapes?” - I guess that is the irony of being limited by generally accepted expression. Loved the twist in the story, refreshing read. If at all we were able to look at things beyond the bias, the world can seem a place of wonder!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm striving to invert many perceptions, Piyush. Subversive, the authorities will call me. Without the twist of subversion there can be no change. No real progress.

      Delete
  6. Matheikal, what a story of wonder. Loved it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm personally discovering certain wonders, Lata. No good literature has ever come out of anywhere else but the writer's personal experiences. :)

      I live in the hinterland of Delhi where reserved forests are being swallowed...

      Delete
  7. wow... what a piece! simply loved it... :-)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Florentino’s Many Loves

Florentino Ariza has had 622 serious relationships (combo pack with sex) apart from numerous fleeting liaisons before he is able to embrace the only woman whom he loved with all his heart and soul. And that embrace happens “after a long and troubled love affair” that lasted 51 years, 9 months, and 4 days. Florentino is in his late 70s when he is able to behold, and hold as well, the very body of his beloved Fermina, who is just a few years younger than him. She now stands before him with her wrinkled shoulders, sagged breasts, and flabby skin that is as pale and cold as a frog’s. It is the culmination of a long, very long, wait as far as Florentino is concerned, the end of his passionate quest for his holy grail. “I’ve remained a virgin for you,” he says. All those 622 and more women whose details filled the 25 diaries that he kept writing with meticulous devotion have now vanished into thin air. They mean nothing now that he has reached where he longed to reach all his life. The

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

Unromantic Men

Romance is a tenderness of the heart. That is disappearing even from the movies. Tenderness of heart is not a virtue anymore; it is a weakness. Who is an ideal man in today’s world? Shakespeare’s Romeo and Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay’s Devdas would be considered as fools in today’s world in which the wealthiest individuals appear on elite lists, ‘strong’ leaders are hailed as nationalist heroes, and success is equated with anything other than traditional virtues. The protagonist of Colleen McCullough’s 1977 novel, The Thorn Birds [which sold more than 33 million copies], is torn between his idealism and his natural weaknesses as a human being. Ralph de Bricassart is a young Catholic priest who is sent on a kind of punishment-appointment to a remote rural area of Australia where the Cleary family arrives from New Zealand in 1921 to take care of the enormous estate of Mary Carson who is Paddy Cleary’s own sister. Meggy Cleary is the only daughter of Paddy and Fiona who have eight so

Octlantis

I was reading an essay on octopuses when friend John walked in. When he is bored of his usual activities – babysitting and gardening – he would come over. Politics was the favourite concern of our conversations. We discussed politics so earnestly that any observer might think that we were running the world through the politicians quite like the gods running it through their devotees. “Octopuses are quite queer creatures,” I said. The essay I was reading had got all my attention. Moreover, I was getting bored of politics which is irredeemable anyway. “They have too many brains and a lot of hearts.” “That’s queer indeed,” John agreed. “Each arm has a mind of its own. Two-thirds of an octopus’s neurons are found in their arms. The arms can taste, touch, feel and act on their own without any input from the brain.” “They are quite like our politicians,” John observed. Everything is linked to politics in John’s mind. I was impressed with his analogy, however. “Perhaps, you’re r

Country without a national language

India has no national language because the country has too many languages. Apart from the officially recognised 22 languages are the hundreds of regional languages and dialects. It would be preposterous to imagine one particular language as the national language in such a situation. That is why the visionary leaders of Independent India decided upon a three-language policy for most purposes: Hindi, English, and the local language. The other day two pranksters from the Hindi belt landed in Bengaluru airport wearing T-shirts declaring Hindi as the national language. They posted a picture on X and it evoked angry responses from a lot of Indians who don’t speak Hindi.  The worthiness of Hindi to be India’s national language was debated umpteen times and there is nothing new to add to all that verbiage. Yet it seems a reminder is in good place now for the likes of the above puerile young men. Language is a power-tool . One of the first things done by colonisers and conquerors is to