Vijaya Sundaram

Poet, Musician, Teacher, and Amateur Visual Artist

Still Point

Still Point

©May 20th, 2015

By Vijaya Sundaram

First, your backbone fuses.

Then, your fingers grow numb, and your toes tingle.

Then, your arms and legs refuse to move.

Then, your face refuses to register your thoughts.

Then, your heart stops.

Then, your eyes stare, full,

So full of galaxies,

No one can bear to see them.

So they close your eyes gently,

Watching your last exhale

Float upwards, a wisp of self —

Floating, then gone.

And you tumble headlong into that tunnel

And your life stretches behind, and above,

And below, and in front of you,

Whirling swirls of life, churning

Out of a primordial Life.

And all those you knew,

Stand ranged along the tunnel

Like images on subway walls

Speeding past, while you stand still,

Their smiles stretched past you.

Their tears scatter on your

Speeding form, like water dashing

Off the roof of a car.

And all those things that

Kept you up at night,

And all those things that

Made you rage blindly,

Made you happy, made you delirious,

Made you ecstatic, made you quiet,

All those things speed by,

Dreams within a dream,

Back, back into that period

Where all light and all darkness

Fused to a single point,

Back through the time before time,

To that still point,

Just before it all began.

Before it will all begin,

Again.

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