Home > 2025 > Peaceful Darkness | Devika Sharma
Mainstream, Vol 63 No 4, January 25, 2025
Peaceful Darkness | Devika Sharma
Sunday 26 January 2025
#socialtagsThe auto met the electric car,In a perfect perpendicularOn the Janpath road, whereChildren, men, and womenHorses, tanks and planes,Come together every year toDisplay India’s cultural and muscular might.One flipped over, the other caved in a little.There was a complete darkness,Beautiful and peaceful,Where there was no thought, no thinkingWhere mind and body were not binariesRather, they were non-existent.The mind, the body, the sensesWere at rest, complete rest.The darkness, which could not be seen,Which cannot be visualised,Maybe comparable to blinding brightness,Which belongs to the realm of wordless and formless.That darkness entered me and surrounded me,It nurtured meIt freed me from memories and sensesIt freed me from past and futureIt freed me from its presentThe darkness became meI became the darkness.No pain,No regret,No frustration,No aspiration,No shame,No humiliation,No longing,No desire,No prayer.Maybe, that is how it isAt one’s own arrivalAt the feet of one’s maker.No meanings woven,No answers sought,No dreams left.Pain dawned on my bodyas I was pulledOut of the auto rickshaw,Blood was gushing through my veins,Little did I know,Blood was oozing out of my head.Love, anxieties, longing and prayer,Desire, past and future,Began catching up,All too soon,Blinding darkness fadedAll too soon.
— Devika Sharma works as a Senior Consultant, Department of Elementary Education, NCERT, New Delhi)