What After The Death?

 

Another death 

Another poignant family 

What dreams may have died?

The moment after the last breath 

What will happen to life?

Where will it go?

Afterlife

It sounds like a hope

Is there really another life to live?

From the moment of leaving the body

The soul may wander around 

Will it meet other souls?

I've seen the last breath of my dad 

I've seen him in my dreams and nightmares 

I wonder where he is right now in this universe!

There are those who proclaim that it's their second life 

They tell about the incidents from their old life

Some even find their old families!

Is there hell and heaven?

 It sounds like two magical worlds

Do we get to live another long life there?  

What is the purpose of this life, if it is meant only to be short?

Has God lined up other tasks for us after the death?

Why does he leave our dreams unfinished?

I wonder if I will get another life

As a microbe, plant, animal, human or even an alien!

It is a mystery similar to how this world popped up from nowhere!

This is based on remnants from a discussion I had with my ex-girlfriend about death, afterlife, soul etc during a holy month. Image is taken from Unsplash. Thanks :)  My Final Day On Earth is the previous poem and  Another Life? is the next poem in this series. 

My Final Day On Earth

 

One final day on this earth is special 

I'll visit a church or temple to pray 

Maybe a bribe to get a ticket to heaven

It's a relief for my broken and lonely heart 

No more battles to fight to survive another day 

No more worries to live through the pain 

I'll try to see the sunrise that I rarely see

I'll tell the sun to be gentle on me that day

I'll walk through the park for one last walk

I'll let the shower be my last rainfall 

And the crushed ice be my last snow 

I'll throw stones in a nearby stream 

I'll write poems from my sweet memories

I'll write an obituary for myself and send 

It to a digital newspaper for publishing 

I don't have many people to meet or call

I'll rather leave short goodbye messages 

With the hope of meeting again somewhere 

I'll hail a taxi and travel around for a while

To see the places I love, near where I live 

To bid adieu to the long walks I used to have

I'll spend some time in my vegetable garden

I'll water my plants and treat them with manure

I'll request someone to look after my garden 

I'll throw away the medicines that control me

And try to sleep on my own for seeing dreams

I'll try to wake up to the nightmares of my past

If there is a beach nearby, I will go there 

Walk on the sands and play with the waves

I hope I would last until the glorious sunset

If not, I will go to a hill for a final trek 

To breathe the misty air from the trees 

And embrace the clouds on the grass

I would cook myself a spicy last dinner 

With a dessert, I loved from my childhood

And one last toast to myself with a wine 

I hope I will see my loved ones waiting for me

Like my grandfather saw his, in the death bed 

I'll go with them without any regrets and sorrow

This poem is based on #journalingprompt 'What would you do if you knew you had one day left to live?' The next poems in this series are What After Death? and  Another Life? . 

A Pithy Smile

I'm missing yesterday's smile of you 

It was magical, made of moonshine 

I thought of visiting you again hours

later, as I wished to see it glint again

 

It was your final pithy smile for me

A talkative girl's silent departing gift

Like a touching speech by an orator

Prepared with soulless emptiness

 

I regret not taking you out in a steam  

Train, that whistles like hustles of rain

Through the snow caped valleys that

You wished to see during last winter

 

You were jaded, as I was so jealous of

your friends, who stole away the time

that I wished to keep aside for ourself

I wish I had words to melt your heart

 

I've read your journal about our breakup

You were sad and let the tears sooth the

pain, You were conscious about state of

my mind, but you chose to remain silent

 

A poem based on word prompts from #WriteMap #moonmystic #poetryprompt #BraveWrite #WIPWordSearch #WordSoupDaily#atreyasverse. Image from Unsplash Thanks to Michael Dam 

An Analyst's Block

I was so excited when I moved to Pune to be  

A market research analyst with the start-up, I associated with for two years

It was my dream job and I had to wait for years for an opportunity

I was struggling with a break-up and a sleep disorder

I was unaware that I was under depression

After a slow start, I enjoyed being involved in all aspects of that firm 

I loved researching markets and analyzing qualitatively

with the tools and techniques available

Finding new trends, technologies and updates 

Then the doctor advised me to quit the medicine and I got

a new medicine of lower dosage, My struggle started right there 

I started losing sleep and I couldn't focus on research

I had a short break during an important week as I struggled 

    I would sit for hours in front of the laptop to only write a few paragraphs 

I started getting headaches, and my world moved slowly 

It was embarrassing, as I couldn't engage in tight deadlines 

I started losing my temper and my frustration increased 

I was working on reports on my own and had targets 

I refused to get involved in an urgent report and company profiles

One day, I felt I couldn't do anything anymore and I asked my 

team leader to let me go home and work from home 

The company owner and team leader decided to allow that  

Provided I meet the monthly targets 

For days I sat blankly in front of a laptop trying to do company profiles 

No matter my efforts, it felt it was beyond me 

I had unfinished reports in front of me and I couldn't finish 

Without medicine, I struggled to sleep and I tried walking 

To tire me and induce sleep, and it took a while for it to work

But still, I couldn't write a thing on my report 

Slowly I was able to research and study other markets

But still, I couldn't do the company profiles and it gave me so much stress 

I had to quit my job and return home and had to engage in another field  

I was diagnosed with depression and I came under medication 

It helped me to come out of stress and be more focused on tasks

The lockdown made me sit at home and do research for a project 

I found research exciting again and spent hours every day 

Then I got a chance to associate with another market research firm

And it gave me the confidence to be a freelancer and found work through analysts 

Then almost two years later, I was doing company profiles in bulk 

And I was doing market research reports again with excitement

It was magical, as I was able to do something I felt was beyond me 

It was like a long writer's block for me that affected my career!

PS: I still wonder why I couldn't do one particular task. It was beyond me at that point. I found it easy later. I am going through another phase of it after an ambitious attempt to come out of medicines. The reduction in dosage left me struggling to do the simple task that I used to do with ease. It doesn't affect my creative writing though. Depression has taken away the joy I had with my work. I had to write this to motivate myself again and continue with my efforts. 

Languages of Life

I can't comprehend the language of love

anymore, I feel I am a new born illiterate 

After unlearning the love and it's mirage

I have frozen the memories in my mind  

I have closed the doors of my faint heart 

Maybe, I am getting older to like misery

Maybe, I am finding peace in the voids 

That I didn't try to fill with a new person

I found my old hobbies more exciting 

That I started doing things I gave up 

I learned the art of gratitude to appreciate

The small things that give me happiness 

I am gifting my precious time to silence 

I am hearing the voices from the nature 

I'm delving deep into the novel thoughts

I'm praying calmly to the god for guidance

I'm dreaming silently about a new destiny

I'm giving my pen ink to write new words

It has opened the floodgates of poetry 

In a way, I am relearning languages of life 

A poem based on wordprompts from #inkmine . Image from Unsplash