The Night of the Brahmastra

The night drew tight her fist; the heavens turned.
No star would look on me; I hid in shame.
Then Kama came, red-handed, crowned with scorn,
And drove me face-first into begging dust.

O depth of depths! My name was filth and loss.
I was a thing unfit to stand or speak.
My shield lay split; my blade forgot its truth.
I crawled, I wept, I cursed my very breath.

I loathed myself. The worms seemed nobler far.
The ground rose high; I lay beneath the low.
Each breath confessed my smallness and my stain.
The wheel rolled on and did not know my name.

No god replied. No dawn would own my cry.
Hope itself turned its face and walked away.
I was undone, unworthy even of fall—
For falling needs a height I did not have.

And there—
Where nothing else would answer,
Where even despair lay spent—
A stillness stood, stark, unsparing, bare.

My Teacher stood within that wordless hush.
He spoke no word; yet all instruction held.
He offered no escape, no promised light—
Only the truth that one last cut remained.

I took the final edge—unborn, uncaused,
Ajati-vada, keen before all time—
Not with hope,
Not with courage,
But because no other thing was left to do.

I did not strike at Kama, nor at self.
I cut the lie that said I was the maker,
That I had borne this world or held its weight.

The cut was clean.
The cut was sufficient.
That stroke itself was Brahmastra entire.

No fire followed.
No echo came.

And in that same plain instant,
Chains failed to close.
No karma found a place to stand.
The wheel stood still for lack of birth.

Kama stood emptied—
Not slain, but finished.

Only then—
Not joy, but breath returned.
Not triumph, but a great unburdening.

From dust I rose, not lifted, but restored.
My kingdom—long usurped—came back to me:
Not land nor throne, but sovereign inner ground,
Where thought obeys and peace stands sentinel.

There was a crown, yet none could see its weight.
There was a joy, yet quiet, firm, and true.
No shout proclaimed it; happiness sufficed—
A settled sun that does not need to blaze.

Now walk I soft upon the narrow rope,
High o’er the dust and clamor of the world.
I rule my step; I answer to the real.
No pride attends me; gratitude alone.

The night did not exalt me—
It returned me to myself.

The fall was dream.
The Teacher stood.
I woke.

The world itself was never born at all.