JOY

     I wonder which that day was when I went crazy, like every child born into this society has to, or rather is made to.

     Born I was to this world. I do not really recollect much from those days, the days when I cried for food when I was hungry, slept when I was sleepy and demanded for my mother when I became lonely. Contended I was when I was fed, happy I felt sleeping. My mother’s arms meant the world to me and my father, oh, how much we laughed together.

     Then came that day when I lost my senses, that day when I was pulled into this den that forms what they call ‘the world’.” Wish for more” they said. And yes I wished. I wished for discontentment, for unhappiness and my wishes like those of every other man on this planet were satisfied.

     I run like crazy behind those things that are always beyond my reach, things that are always disappearing round the corners. Dark alleys everywhere I turn and anywhere I look. They ask me to look for light, to search for a ray among the dense fog. But away from me the beam moves. Each time I see it, I sense its presence, it moves away from me at a speed which forms the limit of motion in the universe, the speed of light.

     I look around, I search around, not once realizing that all I have to do is to stop, and look near me. Never noticing that the flame that I am in constant search of was and is right in front of me. Brightness I am busy searching for among light and darkness I try in vain to remove from around a fire.

     Those days when I lay in my mothers hands, starring at the ceiling, I was happy. I think I realized that even the sorrow that pinched me hard when my mother’s face grew cloudy was part of my joy of living. In those infant days, I was capable of sensing the light around me.

     What blinds me today, I do not know. But know I do that I am blinded, that my eyes are shut as tight as could possibly be.

      I want to open my eyes. I wish everyone would open their eyes, to see that the sun shines on us, that the flowers smile at us, that those birds and bees are the ones singing, wanting us to share with them their beautiful songs. I want to feel once more the joy in just living, just having that kiss from my mother, the smile from my father, that punch from my brother, like in those days when they say you were yet to learn to make sense,  but those that I consider the most meaningful days of our lifetimes…