The cuckoo’s call has always intrigued me. Its relentless urgency creates a sweet yet sad monotony inside the head. The sound haunted me so much that I made both my mobile ringtone and my doorbell sound like the call. One day this March, I was woken up by the cuckoo. Of course, I thought, it’s the laundry boy at the door or my friend on the phone. I opened the door and found no one there. No missed calls on my phone either. Then came the sudden realization that this call was not coming from an electronic device, but from a real cuckoo. Spring had arrived.

Can I be blamed entirely for being surprised by a real cuckoo’s call on a March morning? The scorching heat outside did not remind me of spring. The feeling of spring having ‘arrived’ has become distant for the people of Calcutta in recent years. Even in March, the city is usually suffocating in sweat and heat — it feels more like summer. In April, we are already getting dizzy from the tortuous heat and yearning for a spatter of rain. This year, on April 9, the Celsius had hit the 40-degree mark for the first time.

Spring is the transition between winter and summer. It is a gap, a pregnant void. For me, spring had been a season of rediscovery. Each time with the cuckoo’s call, I would discover a new city within the same old Calcutta. The familiar street corners became enigmatic with the tender breeze caressing the halogen lights. Shimul, palash and krishnachura blooming across Southern Avenue and Alipore Road made each humble Monday morning seem fairytale-like. The air would have a strange fragrance, like that of unrequited love, or of spring itself. Each time I remembered Calcutta from afar, I would recall this smell, this breeze, and the colourful blooms. This season used to make a stale city look beautiful; it gave a city tormented by heat, rain and several uncertainties a much-needed succour.

But the magic wand of a cuckoo’s call does not transform Calcutta into a wonderland any more. They say it is an effect of climate change, which has made the weather of this poor city very volatile. The gap between winter and summer has shortened over the past few years. Now, winter turns into summer almost within two weeks. Spring arrives on the calendar, but the Celsius ignores it. The streets still throw up oodles of shimul and palash. Rituals of colour still take place during Dolpurnima, notwithstanding the heat. But no more does the breeze blow, nor does the fragrance of spring float in the air. Under the roasting sun, the cuckoo starts its persistent call; it goes on and on. The people of Calcutta mistake it for a mobile ringtone or for the sound of an alarm clock.

Ten years from now, will Calcutta still remember spring? Will the cuckoo still call, the palash still bloom? Will the people of this city still put abeer on one another’s face during Dol? If they do, will they still associate the bird, the flower and the festival with a lost season, an extinct evening breeze and a forgotten smell? Without that pregnant void, how will this dreary Calcutta become the city of joy?