They're out there...

I think every word has a soul. I’m not sure, but I think it does. Every word I speak on this mildly cold winter evening will be there long after I’m dead and gone. [While I write this, I begin to think that I should really start thinking before I speak from now on] I think it matches the physics theory which says that energy can’t be created or destroyed. It only changes form. So my words with their little souls will be there always. It doesn’t matter what form they might be in or were in.

They will always be there.

And after I’ve said them, thinkingly or unthinkingly they leave me with their own little souls and travel through the world that is sadly ignorant of their presence. But maybe that’s a good thing, like Gandalf says about the Hobbits. Maybe if they knew that my words with their little fragile souls are there, they’d be out to destroy them. As if they were germs of a deadly disease called knowledge. Ignorance has such a grip. Conformity to ignorance is so natural now. What if the word with the little soul pulls them out of their dark ignorance with its light? What if it makes them think? It isn’t just one word. There are so many, but so fragile.

But sometimes I just think they’re scared of my words. Scared to break away from society, from ignorance that has become so natural. And when you say that you don’t know, they pass you a knowing smile. You always know they do.

And each word, with its little soul is part of my soul. And even though I speak the words and they leave into the world, my soul doesn’t deplete itself, but in some way is richer. It wasn’t there before and although it leaves me, it leaves something behind. Like a sparkling magic that makes me better than before. And even when I’ll have nothing more to say one day, their sparkling magic will remain, even though it might dim – for what has been.

And they know they have to go, have to travel from me, for they have already left their mark on me – their sparkling magic. They go, from me, to you. And they wait there in the corner till you are ready. If you could you would probably bury them alive, so as to remain in your comfortable ignorance. And maybe if you try hard enough you’ll bury them in that corner. But they’ll still be there. And when you say that you don’t know, they pass you a knowing smile. You always know they do. Every smile they throw at you will bring you closer to me. Even when I’m not there. And then, maybe one day, you’ll be unable to ignore them anymore, and you’ll speak them too. They’ll leave their sparkling magic on you and live and travel on.

I know they will live on.

This piece was inspired by Saptarshi’s “Little souls of mine’, and partly by Piglet and Lady Lazarus who I'm reminded of when I wrote this.