The Window to Infinity

Inability to move forth the barrier

Anxiety in staying chained hither

Musings take hold of my existence

And I attempt to look beyond myself

Unsure whether I am an individual or a species

Baffled at the thoughts that I venture into

Wondering if I contain contradictions

As my breath in these multitudes.

The silence of another night speaks

And I see a universe beyond my window

Perhaps dividing illusions and reality

My courage battles with my darkness

As the Lady of Shalott confronts a curse

The curse that created and destroyed humanity

The galaxies in my mind collide

With all their stars floating around.

I wonder if the beauty I witness hither

Is paraphernalia of conquests or cobwebs

I stand at crossroads unable to decide

Which road would commence my journey

It isn't a dilemma of choices

Rather a conflict of peaceful nothingness.

And I ponder upon the possible worlds

Arising out of the multiple universes

Driven by a minute they turn at the edge

The turn that results in fatality or paradise

My sword rests rusted for I haven't fought a battle

Long since I let this nothingness engulf me.

So much that my heart is immersed into it

But it still doesn't seem dark or rotten

Perhaps being stagnant isn't always poisonous

I glance beyond this transparent wall between worlds

And I remember all that could be done

Trying to trigger a wave of action

That would finally make me take that one step

Stories that now seem to be tales from Aesop's fables.

Is it a plague or mere laziness of an empty mind

But is the mind really empty or just plagued by dirt.

Something stirs the silence beneath my window

I watch an old shadow beside the creek

It seems dark yet quite familiar

Beneath my skin blood crawls being aware.

The hooded shadow claims to be the death

My senses shudder a bit giving way to anxiety

I wonder if it is too early for me to encounter death

But it laughs at me in a cacophony

"Haven't you been close to me so often

All when you celebrated the rush of your senses

When you were a kid who couldn't stop taking risks

Climbing difficult terrains, challenging your sphere

Outside the box that was meant for you

Were you afraid of me then?

No. You sought pleasure in defying me

You lived every day to disown me

And hereafter so many years, you shiver

At the thought of not having lived

Before you are ready to defy my presence

I enjoy your helplessness but not much

I seem powerless without a contender

As strong as the mountains once explored

As vibrant as the waves once surfed upon

My opponent is now consumed by life

Yet the signs of life are dismal enough

Don't you see I am death and you are life

But we are quite similar to each other

The grass that you walked upon in peace

Never succumbs to fear when it dies and regrows

Nor does the ocean which you looked at in awe

And the horizon atop the peak you ascended

Gives in to die and be born again every day

Only so you could admire the ecstasy

Of the laws that create and sustain you

You knew all of this when you were a kid

Do humans grow up to be nascent

Or do they forget how fragility is strength

Banging their doors to get acknowledged,

Consumed and get drained of what makes them

For they seem to be foolish enough

To take pride in who they have become

Believing the mirage of their superiority over the universe

Ah! How they build giant abodes

And learn to control technology

Seek pleasure to use it for destruction

Hence exhaust themselves for illusions

Before reality knocks at their boxes 

To take them into nothingness

That constitutes them inside out now

Amusing it is to see how they forget it all.

The universe pours them wine

Portraying illusions of power

And they get lured to believe

Nobody greater than them ever existed

I see you too are getting filled

Up to the brim by this vicious trap"

Death mocks at my shallowness

Leaving me dumbstruck and bewildered

Perhaps this was what the sound of waves say

Or when the wind gushes around wavering through my hair

When I feel small facing the vast ocean

That never takes pride for bringing tornadoes

I had realized this when I struggled to reach

Atop the mountain I admired

Or when I fought my first battle 

Against a ruthless clan on the battlefield

Death had stayed with me

But agreed to bid time for me

Till I had seen all that the world gave me

And here I had ceased to remember

That I exist as the smallest atom

To create a universe with the magic I possess

To exist with continuity until one day

When I need to defy my existence

To justify the existence of eternity of ideas

For I will perish one day

But my musings would remain

Echoing through the wind 

Surpassing lands with enormous waves

Merging into Aurora from the peaks

Perhaps reaching minds that wonder

At a window like this that divides

The worlds of illusions and realities

If the contradictions that make them

Constitute unexplored dimensions

That would make them take that step

To realize that death is not fatal

It is the celebration of a journey

Into a world beyond the unexplored horizon

And all this time when they would have survived

Traversed the journey of life

Death awaited them like a true companion

Through eternity, bringing the peace they sought

Reminding them to live before they die

Perhaps Napoleon would have thought this too

Or Ashoka would have embraced truth once he knew

I wonder if these thoughts are the echoes

Of minds that had once existed here forth

Reaching out to my insomniac mind

When the frequencies collide with my insanity

Hither I stand by the ephemeral window

The wall that merges eternity with pauses

And my sword awaits me to brush off the rust

And plunge my existence into the unknown

Battling towards the end of this journey

For another one accompanies me till the end

To venture into the afterlife one day 

Death awaits me after I have lived enough

There is a celebration in another galaxy

But I will join it once I have celebrated this carousel

I can look back to this world of illusions

Or step ahead from here like humanity

I exist on both sides of the window

And I wonder where I am at twilight

I stand and my sword clings on the edge

I start, I end, I continue till infinity

I am an individual, I am my species,

I die, I am born, I live to die, I die to live.