I was born from the stem as a tiny leaf into the world of fast-paced development. I, unfortunately, did not have much luck to see any of this. I was only a young and innocent baby. I realised soon that I was going to lose everything — my mother and siblings.
I was eager to know more about the world. But I didn’t know that the world and its inhabitants would pose any threat to my life. I was only three days old when I first saw human beings with a big, heavy instrument in their hands. For the first time, and possibly the last, I saw my mother cry. She told me it was an axe and that the people holding it were woodcutters. I was anxious. What is an axe? And then I got my answer when they started cutting through my mother. She was wounded and deeply hurt. With each hit, my mother shook, and we all shivered. Some of my sisters fell on the ground. I managed to cling on to my mother somehow.
Within a few hours, my mother fell over and crashed on the ground. I was thrown off along with my brothers and sisters. Before I could take in everything that had happened, I was crushed under the feet of one of the ‘human beings’. I lay there now, waiting for my last breath.
The writer is in class VII, Excel Public School, Kunnamkulam
