Personal Identity Poem by p.k.n. panicker

A man can witness his funeral

not when on the pyre

but when in a sweet slumber,

mind focussed

on wild poetic imaginations.


No doubt, he can command

his cognitive faculties

to design the pyre

the way he likes it;

Script the epitaph

to be etched on the tomb

if he desires to have one.


No doubt, personal identities

may seem immaterial to many

but in real life

every attempt to erase own identity

creates a greater,

another non-erasable one

of larger dimensions!


Unfortunately no man has control

on what he should be,
how he be treated

or on defining his identities

after death.


Let the dying be satisfied

to bid farewell in peace

leaving no blue prints;

Let the future be not burdened

with your dirty linen;

Let freedom be

to the generations next and the next

to look for and trace our identities,

as and when they desire

to connect with their past,

the roots and the DNA.