THE FINAL DELIVERANCE

His body lay there quite majestically with the head facing the south. They had clad him in a neat white dhothie with his favourite brown shirt.But they had disfigured his face with a piece of cloth tied from his head to neck to keep in place his lower jaw with the upper one .His nostrils were plugged with cotton making it doubly sure that he wont breath again.Also his ears were plugged to prevent him from hearing what they said about him .Funnily a lamp was alighted beside him to keep him guard in broad day light symbolizing the fraility of life.Most of his kith and kin sat surrounding him as if seeing him for the first time or was it the last time?The sun had come out early that day to see him off .The smell of agarbathy pervaded the whole visiting room signaling death .
He felt sorry seeing his body lyiny so helplessly with out any EGO , any senses,or any desires.He could also visualize all the usual worldly rituals associated with any death for that matter,being telecast underneath him ,rather an aerial view of what is happening down below.He could clearly recognice his blank faced,teary and visibly tired wife ,the insecure bewildered sons,the sad and compassionate glances of his parents.He could also hear his friends ,colleagues whispering as to future conduct of the immediate task of disposing the now decomposing body .The TRUTH dawned on him and he felt dumbstruck.HE WAS ALIVE, ONLY THE BODY HAD DIED AND THE FUNNY THING WAS NOBODY KNEW .He cried aloud “I am here only,just take a look above”.Nobody responded .He sailed all over their heads yelling fiercely with out any result.He was desperate ,but was helpless.He swam to the front of the mirror but no more could he visualize that familiar face which used to stare back at him with contempt.So he was a" bodyless” him.He took time to compose himself and the truth frightened the hell out of him.How is he going to live in such a fashion? He vainly tried to wriggle out a cigarette from his nonexisting pocket .He once again lowered his gaze to the body below.He began to miss it for the first time in his life.How much taken for granted attitude had he shown to it in the first place .How much had he abused it.Inspite of all that negligence it had paraded him every where with a sense of pride and belonging .It had given all the pleasures and pain, his identity and vanity .Now there was no use crying over spoilt milk .Now another thought seized his mind .All these years he thought he was the body,but now he could exist with out the body.But then how is he existing in a formless manner.Was he existing as an ego with its mind comprising of desires or as the self as depicted in the scriptures?It should be more of the first than second.He felt a little better now.
Now they were bathing his body and applying the ashes to his forehead and his sons were whispering RAM RAM in his ears their eyes cloudy with tears .What sentimental fools were his sons who couldn’t recognice him and his immortality.Why aren’t they rejoicing at his final deliverance from all bondages and his ultimate voyage to freedom and bliss. He felt sorry for them and for all the mankind .
Still he felt a strong bondage to his body and was truly reluctant to part from it.He shuddered at the idea of it being going to be burnt to ashes.He desperately wanted to get in to it and lead a fresh life ,not the one which he had wasted ,but a fresh beginning in which he promised he will live each second of it with pleasure and not wander about in past or future wasting precious seconds .He wont even go to sleep unless it slept automatically .He will live and die each second . He will give most respect to his senses and will command them to give him back the sensual pleasures as one will sip a precious wine sip by sip.Since life is TIME glorified ,he will never again wear a watch or keep a clock .He will never again work unless it gives him satisfaction or a sense of creativity .He will always be at peace with his world around him.
The four pall bearers lifted his body up to their shoulders and slowly trudged their way to the ambulance followed by the ones near and far.He gave a last parting glance at the body and tearing himself away in a last gasp from the rotten mass of life below he circled the earth in the form of a core of THOUGHTS or IDEAS or VASANAS as described in the holy scriptures and a sudden pull of a gravitational force outwards pushed that mass towards another world where only thoughts and ideas lived.