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Wanting to brag to fellow eighth graders,
During one recess period,
I jump on to the teacher’s desk and
Narrate in an overdramatic tone
“I was a part of a big play, once,
in sixth grade,” then I add nonchalantly,
“the title of the play I do not remember,
but I remember a grand stage,
Shimmering lights,
Set to tell the story of Manu
The only man who survived the
Great flood, the deluge, the Pralay
And how he and Shradha,
The only woman who survived the Pralay
Brought forth
Our world.
Do you know? One couple…
Multiplied to five billion,”
And then I look far away, as if gazing
Into the history of time,
“in some way, all of us are …
connected,
all of us are a family
Yeah, Vasudev Kutumbum
The world is a family.”
And then I snap back to the present and
Clap my hands, as if I have seen
Ali Baba’s treasure
“That must have been the play’s title”
Vasudev Kutumbum, the world’s a family.
I move back to my world of imagination,
“it was a huge stage,
flooded with massive lights,
telling us a story
of the only couple who survived amidst the
primordial outburst
as if the earth was
laughing hard,
and with every chuckle,
it would spurt a fresh gush of water
onto its own surface….
And you know how
they portrayed that?
Little girls, wrapped in
blue sarees,
tippy toed, all over
The stage
Surrounded Manu and Shradha
Giving them both
Hope and despair.”
And I sigh,” ah, yes, I was a part of that play.”
Amazed, in awe,
And in mild jealousy
They ask me,
so who were you?”
Oh, I?
I was the water silly!!
There was no play without me.
To this day, I believe I saw their eyes get wider
And turn greener
But my grown mind now knows
That they must have whispered later
to each other
“a drop in the ocean!”
And yet, night after night,
I told myself,
I was the drop that gave
The water its blue
I was the blueness of water.
And fall asleep to the thought of a
Life well lived.
The Poem was written on March 15, 2002. And the attached picture was taken in South Africa, 2012. But then again, the Ocean is always as 'blue' as we all make it.
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