Past, Present and Future

A puddle of water I beheld;
But an ocean to an ant,
A few drops to an elephant.

Strangely colorless and pure
As freshly fallen rain
Or newly formed dew.

Imagining time to be a long line
With no beginning and no end,
I started searching
For a point to mark the present.

And what shall the point represent,
But the puddle of water I beheld?

Then I started waiting
For the Past and the Future.

As the Sun rose
And the chilliness went,
The puddle started shrinking
And I began recording the changes.

The full puddle became the past,
The shrunk puddle the present.
The future I thought, would be
Just a depression on the ground.

As I lay shuddering at this prospect,
The puddle disappeared as I'd thought.

The Sun fell and the Moon came.
Tears welled up in my eyes.

Mourning the death of the puddle,
I slowly fell asleep.

Later, when chirping birds heralded
The coming morn, I woke up.

I gave one final look at the puddle
And, Holy stars! What did I see?

The future had become the past
And the past was now the present.

The puddle was full again,
And so shall it be with everything else!