Falling in Love with Death

(Sujith Mangala De Silva)

I lay for a while on my bed, lost in thought. The urge to create had surfaced profoundly within the recesses of my mind. Numerous creations played out like unique performances upon the stage of my consciousness, and I immersed myself repeatedly in these visions. Experiencing them with full absorption, I felt a profound solitude, a restless agitation, and a kind of indulgent languor. In those moments, life itself seemed an overwhelmingly oppressive and uncertain force.

With my dearest friend, I reclined on the shore of Mahudu, sipping soma, pondering life and existence. Truly, we were lovers of death. Life appeared to us as a lonely, dark, dead star suspended in the infinite universe. If that star could think, it would feel sorrow, pain, desolation, and discontent emotions we sensed deeply. Often, we spoke of ending our lives. We held those who took their lives in deep respect. There were moments when we too might have been capable of it, yet it had never come to pass simply because we did not know the way.

During these conversations, I shared with my friend the extremely dark, desolate, and sorrowful nature I felt. I sensed that some force within me, unseen and eternal, sought to save me from all my pleasures. Alongside this inner drive for life, I struggled to draw breath, and a slight difficulty in breathing arose. Though I breathed deeply, the waves of air failed to fill me with the calm, nourishing satisfaction I had known before. The profound mental and physical ease that came from breathing previously now returned only fleetingly to my memory; I had never before experienced such pleasure and serenity in mere inhalation.

Suddenly, I felt a constriction, as if my breath were trapped, threatening to cease. At the same time, I experienced an intense desire and lust for life. I labored to control my breathing, inhaling and exhaling with extreme effort. Pain and anguish surged through me, accompanied by a great internal cry of self-compassion. I felt as if I wished to tear life itself open so that the world might hear my anguish. My heart, brimming with suffering and longing, seemed ready to leap from my chest.

I longed to cling to my loved ones, to hold them close, to merge with them in desperate embrace. My heart pounded fiercely, its thundering echo surpassing the limits of my hearing. It felt as though I were being pulled into a pale void where nothing existed, unseen, unheard, unknown. At times, I seemed to drift into infinity, only to return, reborn, with each blink of an eye.

I recalled everything in life memories of her pressed upon me with overwhelming intensity. I felt immense sorrow. How cruel, I thought, that these dear ones, in the midst of dark, empty nights, would remain unaware of what had transpired. Her grace, her smile, her gestures, her embrace intoxicated me. How cruel fate was… yet she knew nothing of it. Parents, siblings, friends, relatives these faces appeared vividly in my mind. I longed to rush to them, to hide among them, to escape through their protection. I thought how precious it would be if all this were only a dream.

The complexity of these experiences, however, did not touch the full dimensions of my mind. They slowed my physical actions and silenced me. I navigated the unseen, dark world of my consciousness with hands, eyes, and mind immersed in the inexpressible. My friend told me I was safe, yet… what could I do? Could you even understand? A faint tear rested in my eye. How could I even write of this? It was all over.

At last, from a distant pale horizon, something appeared. “Forgive me, friend! Why are your eyes wet with tears? I had often thought of ending my life. Yet consciously, I could not bring myself to do it. But I loved death deeply. Still, I could not destroy life. I do not know why. I constantly wondered how much one gains from controlling someone unknowingly. How fortunate would it be? How gladly would I embrace death then, at least, I would not have forced myself upon life. I thought once again of being a mere grain of sand, because then death might come to me as a decree. Yet I do not wish to destroy the lives of ordinary people for the sake of my desire to die. I have no such right.”

I knew you, as I knew myself, as someone who loved death profoundly. So I thought that giving you control was a great favor. For if you, too, were helpless in such a situation, I wanted at least to grant you the comfort that I could not find for myself. In some small way, you, too, might escape the futile entrapment of life eating, drinking, sleeping, awakening, dressing, earning, learning, thinking, speaking, acting what is all this? Aren’t these the illusions, the vanity, the dreams, the excesses, the desires of life? How cruel this trap of existence! When I loved death, all I could do was love you.

Yet now, I feel, had you given me such control, I, too, would have faced an incomprehensible condition. I do not think it would have been a fault of yours or mine. For in loving death, we had only ever bound ourselves to life once more. We had only succumbed to the harsh truth of existence. It is a facet of life’s cruelty. Neither of us could escape it. In that void, in that singularity, we dissolve. All of life is merely the stark reality of the present. No one triumphs over this void. All of us are defeated within it. Is this not the truth? How then could I express it to you? Farewell, my friend.”

In this way, countless creations traversed the seas of my consciousness. One powerful vision, like a seed nurtured by the earth and reaching for the sun, swept all others away, casting my imaginative voyages into a vast storm. A great misfortune, a futility, a deep sense of negation rooted itself in my consciousness. From this void, I let all those visions return to the world, leaving me at last in emptiness.