While You Were Sleeping Poem by Shankaran Kutty

While you were sleeping
I took a walk down to the beach
The strong icy breeze that struck needles
On my face, my dry lips shivered, each
Wave I found dying on the shore but
They kept coming, never failing to die
In our false search of our eternity, I saw
In those dying waves, true eternity lie

While you were sleeping
A million breaths somewhere did cease
Yet a million others were elsewhere first taken
A million dreams did midway freeze
Some broken by the first rays of dawn
Others shattered by the fate’s inevitable claim
And yet when you woke to the same gently breeze
The morning smell of earth remained the same

While you were sleeping
Somewhere a hand reached out in hope
Not to steal, but for a little morsel
To subdue their hunger they could not cope
A little child somewhere near you
For a day in school, did silently yearn
Which he could only the day someone
Else for his family, would daily earn

While you were sleeping
I went through the life we have gone by
The letters you wrote, the songs you hummed
The little dreams we have let die
The birthday gifts, the little joys
Our little pains, the occasional sigh
Those things in the cellar, we bought yet never used
The shopping lists which we never did buy

While you were sleeping
A few more breaths we reached near
To the journey’s inevitable end
An end, I have long stopped to fear
For this bright moonlight night
In the clear sky I can see so far
My dreams, my final destination
A lonely, twinkling unnamed star