Rainforest rain

  It has been  raining since last night .

This is a tropical rain forest , and this is how it rains . A uniform bank of clouds forms overnight , regardless of the current weather . So , this layer of clouds prevents the usual escape of the heat waves into the atmosphere , and you sweat . This layer of clouds is totally oblivious to your predicament . Whether you are hiding beneath a thin 'chaddar ' or a thick mink blanket , you are doomed to feel hot . Momentarily . Then it starts . 

The drizzle . A tiny innocuous shower , that wets your verandah and the kitchen towels  you set out to dry the previous evening . Then it tightens its grip . The rain . Slowly , and imperceptibly . The rain goes on . Endlessly . The holes in your umbrellas are needlessly revealed . 

Your carefully grown petunias and marigolds , gazzinias and dahlias , chrysanthemums and bryophyllums take the beating . Some still stand tall , even after 10 hours of continuous pitter patter , other just throw in the towel , and lie down to hug the earth , flatter the better . 

"Phshaw ! This rain !! It is nothing , it will just go away "  This boastful remark from a son of the soil , product of the land , a local inhabitant . These words , spoken in the early morning , were eaten , soggy and dripping , in the evening . By this time , the so called local inhabitant' s jacket was sodden , the mood not -so-ebullient and shoes wet and clammy . 

The rain persists , and the jackals are quiet tonight . There are no war cries , no skirmish amongst the dog-clans , no protests amongst the babblers and the woodpecker has not been out to peck the wood . 

The forest is wet and muddy , silent and moody . By now , even the driest areas of the trees have been rendered wet . 

The hard to reach trunks , the soil clutched in the tenacious fingers of its roots , the innermost branch , the new born leaves , the insides of flowering hedges , where sunbirds make their nests , and the densest foliage , where the cuckoo sidles to , to swallow its last morsel of semi ripe papaya, all are damp . 

The cars spray mud along with the crunch of gravels and the bird bath needlessly fills up , with the water from the heavens .