Reaching out.....

Bridge: a structure built to span a gorge, valley, river, railroad track or any other physical obstacle, for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle.

(Hohenzollern Bridge at Cologne.)

This is precisely what the poem by Herman Hesse did. It created a bridge between my friend IH, a German who lives in the UK, and me, an Indian who lives in India. A shared inexplicable heartache spans across age, distance and culture....

STEPS
Just as every flower wilts and youth
yields to old age, so blossoms life at every stage
so flourishes each wisdom and each virtue
in its time, and cannot last forever.
The heart must be ready to depart
and recommence at each life's calling.
To give itself to new bonds
courageously and without mourning.
In each beginning lives a magic
that shields and helps us live.

Lightly moving room through room, we should
cling to nothing for refuge.
The cosmic spirit restrains us not
but stage through stage raises us, widens us.
Barely settled in a way of life,
feeling at home, and indolence threatens.
Only the one willing to pack and leave
can shrug off paralysing habits

Maybe even the hour of death
will send forth new realms,
the call of life will never end?
Go on, my heart, depart and heal.


Thank you, I.