I am here, Just where I am.

A long while ago, where was I?

Was I on this plane or another one?

Or was the long time never there?

I yet wonder for life seemed just too short

And passed away, just as each face passed away at every phase,

 At two, I wondered why the other seemed taller than me.

At five, life’s cruel side shook the grounds of where we stood, mother and me,

For it took away my father’s life. Even as I grieved, it changed its side from cruel to kind,

  It was exciting me, with all its rides.

The swings and slides of childhood soon gave way to wilder dreams that dominated my teens.

My days flew high, and the nights rocking as the fit body chased adventures unknown,

 Where only boosting the adrenalin was known.

Then came the years of working off my butts, which sometimes drove me nuts.

Along with this came the phase where I chose my partner to share my space,

Unknowingly walking at the other’s pace.

Then, creation demanded that we make more of our kind,

 So, as two more entered our plane,

The joys were there, and so was the pain,

And before we knew it, days passed by uncounted,

Until when the fledglings were ready to fly.

A melancholy set in as I asked,

“Were they now there where I once was?”

Suddenly, a shattering knock shook my being as life knocked once more.

“What is it now? I want just to be”, I said, for mid-life hormones made me sore.

“Let the hormones be for duty calls”, said life.

Mother stood at the door, and I gazed at her forlorn arms, baggy eye sockets, toothless jaws, infirm legs, groping on crutches, silently passing on the message that it was time for her exit.

And then I asked her, “Why did one ever exist?”

Was it to move from one stage to another? And say, “Hurrah! One milestone crossed for I am where you were” to the candidate ahead of your stage.”

We are moving forward but seem to fall into a ditch.

Mother, I said, life is playing its tricks, for we don’t know the pitch,

“Do you get me?” I desperately asked her.

And looking at her, I said, “I’ll be there too, where you are”.

She replied, “ Listen carefully; I remember those days when I frolicked and ran free in the wind.

I was present then and marked my presence in the Book of Life.

 Then, as I grew older and moved further along the timeline, I experienced moments of fun and then came the urge for more.

As I went further, I accosted a moment of pain and feared it would happen again.

So, in the desire for pleasure and fear of pain, I ran helter-skelter between the two

 and missed the presence of being, which has made me sore.

Now, at the end of my biological clock, all I have to say is be wise.

Don’t carry pleasure or pain; they come to us at some stages.

 Be with them as long as they are, then let them go.

Oh, ma, “ Is it not the way of the world?”

Yes, but not the ways of life, for life tells you

“Live now, at this moment, and do not think of another one”.

Mark your presence now, and do so with each one.

Saying so, she smiled, “ I’ve found my Eureka moment now.”

  and I’ll mark my essence with its presence.

I know I’m late and have withered, but I’ve seen the truth,

But you, dear one, seal the memory lane, and then,

Pop opens a fresh new one, imploring you to live in it.

Live in it fully; and as it goes, you won’t need to cling on.

For then will come another new day.

Then, one fine morning, as she departed, she blessed me with a smile and twinkling eyes as if to say, “As I leave, I’ll be your past, but right now, I’m here and aware that it’s our last.

She looked again at me, “Alert my child, I’m going, and saying so, she vanished into the light.

I was filled with love and light, too.

I know there was no remorse, for she had taken the true wisdom of life in her essence.

And for me, she had blessed me right, “I was here where I am, not where she was.”