Part – I
There was that other thing we wanted to talk about…?
Remember? About
That thing beyond the mountain,
That thing beneath the sea,
That thing above the sky.
Yes – that one.
The mix of innocence and
A nameless science.
Are you sure about this?
Are you sure you want to know?
Yes.
I have waited years for the answer.
I’ve worked hard for it.
I’ve wanted to know for as long as I can remember.
I have never unremembered.
Then open your ears and listen.
Being is the lingering scent of a rose,
The juice of poetry in exquisite prose,
The music wafting over finger-plucked strings,
The cognition of joy and suffering.
Being is suffocating.
Being is bliss.
Being is.
And non-being?
Non-being cannot be described: it can only be talked about in terms of being.
By not being, a thing can
Be everywhere,
Be everything but
Be.
By Being, one is limited,
Confined, but only
By Being,
Can it also
Not-Be.
How can I Be & Not-Be?
First, understand: You must be to not-be.
This is the only way: You cannot not-be and then try to be!
I mean, you can… but it’s not a conscious choice (it cannot be).
When you are not, what is it that funnels your infinity
Into something that is?
At least when you are, you can slowly
Let go of things that you think make you,
Until you stand naked:
Just you: no soul, no flesh, no muscle, no bone, no nerves, no skin, no hair, no sense.
Just you: homeless, in the sense that you’ve lost everything that would point you home,
Including the stars; including directions.
Just you, in the shape you were the moment you stopped to not-be,
And became.
When you let go of that last little sliver of shadow
That you call you,
You cease, momentarily,
To be.
This is one of the greatest struggles of life:
the transitory achievement of non-existence,
while solidly existing.
I wonder if non-beings also struggle to achieve transitory states of Becoming, and instead,
Overindulging,
End up as beings.
Is that why our lives are one long scream camouflaged
By the cacophonous volume of experience?
Were we, you and I, once Non-Beings-at-large,
Reduced to the claustrophobia of existence,
Because of a curiosity-fueled attempt at Being?
(And if so, will we, you and I, continue down this road
And suddenly Not-Be?)
Are non-beings really all that different from us?
Or is it that
To be and to not-be
Are the same thing
Separated by a mirage-like symmetry:
When you ‘Be’, you know, you know that you know, and you know ‘you’.
When you ‘Not-Be’, you don’t know, you don’t know that you don’t know, and you don’t know ‘you’.
All I know for sure is this:
To Be is to be aware of your existence.
To Not-Be is to not be aware of even non-existence.
***Part I Ends***
Rohit Nalluri 
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