The Hen and the Lost Paradise
“… just as a hen gathers her brood under her words..”, Mama remembered the verse when she called out to her chicks.
It was already dark. The woman in the house had switched off the light in the backyard and closed the door. There was a dim streetlight at the corner of the street.
Chicks ran towards her. She gathered all of them. They plucked few grains of rice off the plate.
As they all huddled together, there was quiet for some time.
“How long the quiet would last?” wondered mama.
There was a harmony of giggles and the tiniest of them prodded her.
“Mama!”
“Yes, my dear!”
“When it was bedtime, mama knew that it was the most difficult thing to force them to sleep. There were hundreds of questions that slap at your ignorance.
“Have you seen a ghost?”
“No, I haven’t”, replied mama.
“Do you believe in them?”
“Yes, may be, but..”, she was cautious not to be trapped in a long bedtime story.
But tiny was not the one to allow her to escape.
“Yes, I have heard a story about one of your ancestors.”
All the chicks were excited to hear.
“We are one of the few lucky ones to grow and live freely…”
Tiny interrupted. She was too small to comprehend freedom.
Mama brushed aside the interruption as she was in a hurry to finish the story.
During the days of one of your forefathers, when she grew up like this, there was a distress in the family. The landlady decided to sell the chicken.
Again interruption and brush aside as usual.
She continued.
“A man from the neighbourhood came, grabbed the hen by her feathers, and seemed to calculate something in his mind. After a few minutes of negotiations with the lady, he tied her legs with a rope and tied the other end to the handlebar of the bicycle and rode away. All the way, she hung upside down.”
“It was ridiculous and at the same time, pathetic to see her in that position,” sighed mama.
The chicks also sighed, but didn’t realize why she should be carried so.
In a shop, he pushed her inside a large flat rectangular cage, where there were already couple of chickens.
Sometime later, the man opened the cage, pulled her out and few moments later, she was dead.
The chicks were quite disappointed, for they feared the end of the story.
Luckily mama continued.
“When she died, she found herself floating. She had the realization. To her horror, she saw her body dressed and cut into chunks. At the same time she realized she was free — from pain, wants…”
Not knowing what to do, she recalled her life. She decided to use the best of her time and the freedom.
She looked for the man who strangled and twisted her neck. She remembered the pain. She saw him going away in his bicycle.
Enraged, she flew in a jiffy towards him. With the force of a gale, she whizzed around his head. The man lost his balance. Both he and the bicycle fell down with a loud thump.
The chicks jumped and thumped their feet on the ground. They giggled loudly.
“What did she do next?”
“Then she rushed to the street where had lived. She saw the boys playing street games. She spotted the boy who would throw stones at her. She wanted to give back.”
“She pulled him. The boy tried to move, but couldn’t. She pulled the trouser down. When other boys saw, they burst into laughter. The boy freed himself, ran towards his home and on the way, tripped.”
The ghost was very pleased with her strength. It didn’t last.
The chicks shouted, “Oh!”
A guardian angel appeared before her, apologized for being late, escorted her to a place where the dead assemble.
When her turn came, the judge looked at her and rebuked her.
“Why? She didn’t do any wrong!” The chicks were unanimous.
“The judge was sympathetic about the purpose and the role of the hen in the worldly life, but condemned her for the abuse of the power. He decided to repeat the life again on earth.”
The chicks concluded that it was unfair.
