The tear
I
t slowly, agonizingly… almost shyly slides down the cheek. Shining, glistening… there’s a melancholy beauty in watching someone’s pain manifest itself physically, not as a torrent of uncontained emotion, but as a silent testament to the helplessness within.
being of what they have seen.
Finally, the drops slow, and cease their ponderous fall into the depths… for even they cannot ease his pain, merely giving it form and substance temporarily. He stares at what they have become, fallen from splendor and broken to bits… but But my reflection in the mirror notices that the shards are still of would beg to disagree. All he can the same sculpted shape. Still they feel is the sadness, so the haunting make the same beautiful reflections, beauty of the scene escapes him. and slowly start to join together to Clutching the corner of the basin, form as a whole again. he lets known his grief. Too much Then, he starts to think as I do of a man to show it to the world, now… starts to dream of hope and he hides within himself, refusing to of rebuilding that which was lost, acknowledge to anyone but his own for it is only truly lost to us if we image before him how he feels. He let it go, truly destroyed only if we bares his heart to the one person acknowledge its end. He looks up who cannot save him from his at me, with a fire in his eyes that anguish. Himself. has been missing for a while, and And so he watches the drop the determination of a man who slide down, tracing its path with has hope and something to live and tormented eyes, seeking solace fight for, and I now know what to do. in its journey but finding none. I turn my back to him, and walk out Quivering on the edge, it threatens to the world. Still I will hide my grief, to fall at the slightest provocation, this time not out of a misplaced to fall inexorably to its destruction… sense of pride, but because to show and he just stares. Perhaps if it had a it would be to accept it, and thus voice, a heart, it could explain how it make it real. I turn away from him feels at the end, because it would be because he needs me no longer, and exactly what he is… broken. I must use what I have learned. And yet the drop trembles on the Perhaps the pure light of happiness brink, almost as if it harbors a final shall not be mine yet, but I shall act hope that this is not the end. With a as the broken shards of the drop do, casual flick, he sends it to its doom, and reflect the light to others. My reveling in its fall, watching it all the salvation will lie in the joy of others while until it shatters. and, as is the course of nature, my As he watches it fall, more flow to pieces shall be mended, my shards join it. A torrent of droplets course joined to unite me with myself, the their way through their existence, world, and all that I desire. doomed as his creation, offering Then I shall again face myself in the him both comfort and suffering. But mirror, smile at my image and say “I as each one plummets, he admires told you so”. them as I do now, the sculpted shapes and beautiful reflections, ......................................................... watchful witnesses of his torment, who will never live to tell another
- Pradeep Damodara