As I grow up every day, the significance and meaning of everything changes. Whatever I used to think about a specific circumstance has changed and keeps changing everyday, even about death. For most people death means simply vanishing forever. But for me, death is something that at every moment threatens me. When someone dies, I only have this one thought: ‘maybe I am next’. It wasn’t the same, though. As a child it never frightened me. My grandfather died and on the third day of his death I yearned to go out with the visitors. I never knew what it means or how it feels. After evolving a little bit I realised death isn’t that simple; it’s cruel. I learned that those who die won’t come back ever. I started understanding God and I was afraid to die, not because I was scared to leave this world (I actually hated it) but just because I was ashamed that I haven’t performed any good deed. Then, when I grew up and started understanding things reasonably, I began perceiving pain. Every minor event started affecting me and the only thing I desired was death. I hoped to liberate this soul from this body because I assumed it might attain stability after that. The turmoil that was going on in my head, I thought only death can alleviate it. But that, too, changed.
It all brought me to this phase of life where I am, presently. Now that I’ve survived for 19 years of my life and am in my 20s, I have literally started cherishing this life. I accept it as a blessing now. As I go on living, obviously I make new connections and friends and I get more attached to my family and that only heightens the fear of death and leaving it all forever. But I know I will die, eventually. This thought of just disappearing from everyone’s life haunts me. Now that I hear of someone’s death, I tremble with fear.
A man died in our locality. He was young, had little kids and a young wife. On his death the whole street was occupied with cars. The whole village was crowded with people. There was only mourning and screaming and sadness everywhere. His spouse went to his grave for numerous days after his death and screamed loudly. Then the locals would go and comfort her and take her back home. That terrified me. People from distant places attended his funeral. Even now I hear the screams whenever I am alone. He died but maybe there was something about him that everyone remembers. He left a legacy. A few days ago, another man died here. He was an old man, but not that old though. I am no one to judge, of course, but he wasn’t virtuously that good. He used to go to everyone’s place and eat and maybe beg. On his death, everything was quiet, roads were vacant, even his house was empty. His funeral was attended by a few people and that too out of sympathy maybe. No screaming, no mourning, nothing. He left nothing behind, not even memories. I don’t know if anyone remembers him except me. Not even a single day has passed after his death when I haven’t thought of him. Not because I was emotionally attached to him in any way but just because his death scared me more than the former one’s.
Death is unavoidable. That doesn’t scare me more than the feeling of dying without leaving a trace of my existence. I don’t know when or how I’ll die, I just want to make sure I am ready for it whenever it decides to visit. I don’t want to leave just like a passing cloud. I want people to remember me for the rest of their being. Those who admire me will clearly miss me but those who have nothing to do with me, I want them to recall that someone named ‘Shafiya Showkat’ was here and that she wasn’t an ordinary soul as she was rare, she possessed an extraordinary spirit in this ordinary world.
To some extent I surmise I’ve achieved that goal, from being a no-one I have started to become someone. When I first started writing in my journal, I once jotted down that I desire to do something that is truly unique; I want everyone to know me and not just my face. I want them to know me by what I do, by my work. I want them to see my work and create an impression of me in their minds that is even better than how I am in actuality. And that is turning out to be true to a slight extent. Ever since I’ve started writing and my articles are getting published, people have actually started to recognize me. Due to the lockdown not many people know me by my face but whenever I address them they are like, ‘Are you Shafiya?’ and I am like, ‘Yeah, I guess I am’. They tell me that they read my articles and they like my writing and they find it quite relatable. And that feeling is just the best. Even if it’s comparable to zero but somehow people are cherishing me. I am getting better and better every day. With the encouragement of my teachers and friends, I have started to live in the actual sense (although I never say it out aloud, I love them. I am not good at expressing myself but I truly respect them and their support keeps me going and I remember every single word they’ve ever said to me. They are helping me in radiating that spark that I want to leave behind after I am dead).
Still I’ve only scratched the surface. I want everyone to love me and remember me but sometimes I feel like, how will they? I remain in my house for most of the time. Even my neighbours see me only when I go to college and during vacations I think they completely forget about me. I desire to be remembered after death and while I am living I have created a huge wall around me so that no one comes in. That’s weird. Anyhow, there’s hope that time will change, it always does. What I am today, maybe I won’t be that tomorrow, but I’ll make sure that I do my best to stay alive and not just breathe. I’ll try to work, struggle, and work harder so that when I am gone, people will attend my funeral and not just because I died but because they’ve certainly lost someone. I’ll try to leave something that will always be alive and will always remind everyone that I was here. On this journey of life I aspire that I won’t regret even a single second and after death I hope I’ll go one living. And yeah, make sure you do the same because you do need people to care about you even after death. You need blessings after death as much as you do while living. So, you better be valuable or else you’ll just die and it’ll look like humanity got rid of another obligation. Because even if life is beautiful and lovely, it’s not forever and life promises nothing except death. But at least live, love, learn and work so that death won’t be the end of your story.
I think my poem sums up this article:
I never want to die
When I am gone
Where will you find me?
For I am almost like the
Haley’s comet that’s glimpsed
Merely once in a decade.
However if you are the one
among those who cherish me
Then search me in the sky,
With the thousand clouds
I’ll be the one standing out.
In the gloomy twilight,
I’ll be the glossiest star.
In Autumn don’t scour me
In the fallen leaves, for
I will be the one hanging on
The branches till the verge
If you ever forget my presence
In the summer, the luminous glints
Of the sun will remind you
That I still prevail somewhere.
In the spring mornings
I’ll be the initial dew drop
On the blushing roses.
I never want to die entirely
Thus I’ll leave a spark everywhere
Nonetheless, if you fail
To uncover me
Just search me in my phrases
That I’ll keep engraved
On those vacant pages
For they’ll be the only evidence
That I was here and I was real
And that I haven’t died
Even after being buried.

—[email protected]

Shafiya Showkat