the winding hill roads
that twist and turn
a stark brownness prevails
parched and withered

June in the plains
June in the hills

climate change say some
the heat is killing say many more
global warming say some
nothing doing say many more

and the bare branches 
the dried leaves
the withered branches
the shrivelled grass
stand still
under the hazy sky

forest fires rage

…

Nishi Pulugurtha is academic, author, poet and translator. Her publications include: travel writing – Out in the Open, Across and Beyond; poetry – The Real and the Unreal and Other Poems, Raindrops on the Periwinkle (Writers Workshop), Looking Poems (Red River); a coedited volume of poems – Voices and Vision, The First IPPL Anthology; short stories – The Window Sill, essays – Lockdown Times and critical essays – Literary Presentations of Pandemics, Epidemics and Pestilence (Routledge). Her co-edited translation work and a fourth volume of poems is forthcoming.