MY FIRST POEM

Now, whenever I feel stupid, meaningless or such, I just read that poem and the numerous others that followed. I feel a lot better after reading them. It’s nice to have something so dear for oneself. The best part of it is that none, save for me, in the world has read this poem. When you have something like that, it feels eerily special.

I was on vacation to a Hill station (Munnar) in Kerala (in south India). My parents, my sister and I went to a beautiful waterfall in that place. We spent two hours there. I was sitting on a huge boulder and watching the red sky through the openings in the green treetops with all the bizarre bird noises and the sound of flowing water in the background. The sun was almost about to set but it was bright enough for us to see things.

I was alone and sitting on top of a 15-feet tall, almost round boulder. The boulder was shaped in such a way that, seated at the top, I couldn't see what was underneath it. The furthest thing that I could see touching the boulder was my feet with soft flowing water 7 feet away in the background. I inched closer towards the edge of the boulder till I came to a point where I could slip away any moment. I just sat there pondering what might be under the boulder and if I would survive the fall. I was sitting there in that vulnerable position for about fifteen minutes. My palms and feet moistened with perspiration. Then I just thought "what the heck...let me just see what’s under it" and I leaned forward and then I began slipping forward. First slowly and then faster till my body was tangent to the boulder. Then it was free fall. I'm sure the whole fall lasted for some 2-4 seconds. But, whenever things like this happen, one becomes hyper-conscious. To me things seemed to happen in slow motion at that point. I was falling...falling with all my senses fully alerted…. Everything that I could see, hear, feel and experience was amplified. Finally, I just fell and to my bad luck, there were smaller sharp rocks right at the end of that boulder where I landed. One cut through into my forearm and another into my hip while my bottom landed on flat rock. I just sat there for a couple of minutes replaying the whole instance repeatedly in my head. It was so hard to even move my body for those two minutes. I saw thick jets of blood flowing away from my body along with the river. It almost seemed like I lost all control of my body. I couldn't even try to stand up. I couldn't even remember which muscle to move; because the experience of fear and surprise was so powerful. Finally, I stood up with great discomfort and as my hip bones were really hurt, I couldn't walk properly. My legs were shivering uncontrollably. They were becoming numb. At this time, a rather queer realization dawned upon me…I realized how fragile the human body was. But, nonetheless, what made this a powerful moment were those 3 seconds of unexpected hyper-conscious feeling filled with fear, anticipation and vulnerability. Such a feeling has a once in a lifetime quality to it. In fact, before I started to slip away, I didn't just back off when I knew that I'd fall because, I clearly knew that whatever was about to happen had the potential to stay in my head for a long time and that those were the moments that bring a smile to one’s face when recollected.

The incident probably inflicted some injuries in me and probably ruined the holiday trip too; but now, I know that I may never get the chance to experience the same feeling again. It was such an expensive feeling that would last in my mind for a long time to come.

I was so depressed with my life and felt so stupid, useless and meaningless one night; and I just couldn't take it anymore. I was sitting in my dark room with an everlasting wry expression on my face. I felt so depressed for various reasons. I went up to the rooftop of my apartment building and climbed on top of the water supply tank which was higher up than the rest of the terrace. I lied down on top of the tank. The view contained an uninterrupted 180 degree hemisphere dotted with stars and a full moon. I focused all my attention to the stars in front of me. The soothing breeze hit me gently. It was a slow and silent night. I observed the twinkling stars closely. They, as I’d already noticed, weren’t twinkling; they were just changing their color from red to blue and such. It felt so nice watching them do it. I closed my eyes and just visualized getting out of my body and wandering through the space. I wandered through the dense clouds of stardust unaffected. I stayed there…for a long time…till I was completely absorbed and soothed. Then, I opened my eyes and I was smiling.

The sheer thought of the existence of those colossal, busy stars and their cosmic dance just shrunk all my worries. I realized that all the things that we often worry ourselves with are very meager when compared to things that we don't normally think about. The existence of all that magnificence independent of all that I cared about made the meaningful things in my world seem insignificant. After this incident, whenever I feel sad, depressed or worried about something, I just think of those magnificent stars that just ‘are’ and feel my worries shrink away.