Philip H Alo
Kohima
In a jungle far away, dwelt animals of all shape, size and color, from white to grey. The citizens lived privy from beyond the boundaries of the jungle, sufficed and contend with the pasture where they grazed. And yet they never knew what joy and harmony was, for the grass was not as fresh as hay and the water in the river a puddle of mud. But yet they grazed and drank for what choices had the poor animal citizens but to graze and drink.
For too long it lasted and now the fields of grass was scaling down to an alarming rate of famine, and the river barely running. They had to move to another vicinity; a place with fresh grass and blue rivers. But no one moved not because they couldn’t but weren’t allowed by scribes of the ancient scrolls that had penned the jungle belonged to the animals, and the animals belonged in the jungle.
And so it happened, one fiery summer a fire of wild passing by the wind took notice of the jungle and the animals and decided to visit them. As it touched the jungle, the jungle began to torch and blaze. This time there was no stopping anything and every animal spread scattered running gasping for breath and seeking out promising shelter. Many leaders of kind and groups gathered the panicked citizens in queue and groups. Without any road map and plan, they all set moving towards finding a new home and on it to promise a paradise for all the future kin.
As they journeyed, they at times took the wrong turns with collateral damages and met dead ends and thorny undergrowths, still they learned and turned looking for alternate route for the new home. Though some kept chewing the same rug most took sense of the journey and to learn and explore while on it. Some of the ones at the forefront were the hyenas, lions, ostriches, elephants, lemurs, cheetahs etc. and they walked and the citizens followed suit. The birds also flew and accompanied the journey. The birds who navigated the sky and saw the earth with their ethereal eyesight also chirped to the citizens below. The land dwellers could only listen to sounds from the ground and as the ones in the forefront took the next step, the rest followed.
This concludes the unfinished journey of the beautiful inhabitants of the incinerated forest. It took Moses forty years to lead the Israelites from wilderness to Canaan, and it is with faith the citizens travelled to seek their new home free from corruption in the jungle law never to revert back but to thrive in exuberance for eternity.
