Sehnsucht

Everything is still as a picture outside. Apart from the occasional chirring of lonesome crickets, there is pin drop silence all around. It's hard to believe how quiet it is, considering how it had rained quite heavily just an hour ago.

The dew drops caught in between the recesses of the iron-gate look like tiny little pearls in the dim light that's streaming in from the house across the street. The puddles on the road glisten in the gloomy light and catch my fancy every now and then.  

The wholesome silence of the night- which was beginning to offer appetizing fodder for introspection and contemplation, mind you - is suddenly disturbed by a sunburst of sound and light.

SLOSH!  A car just sped by, strong beams of its headlight intruding the stillness first, followed by the splashing of the tires against the luminous puddles. The car turns around the corner, and everything slowly settles into place again...not without grumbling a little first. 

I don't know what it was that triggered it, but something within me gave in; the feeling of tranquility that had kept me company before the unexpected intrusion started to crumble into tiny little shards of longing...for a nameless something or someplace that exists somewhere in the ancient tomb of memories buried in the back of my mind and that shows up in all its naked glory only in my dreams...

Sometimes you don't miss a certain something or someone or someplace. Sometimes you miss a body, a collection, a mass of people, places and things that you used to know...

Other times, though, you don't just miss the familiar. You long for something or someone or someplace that you don't even know but can't help missing. You long for a world so different from your own, despite the fact that your world's the only one you've ever known. You're not conscious of what it is that you're pining for, but the feeling's there all the same...strong and powerful. It's like nostalgia, only with a twist: instead of missing someone or something you used to know, you find yourself unconsciously aching for that extra something that you desperately want to catch hold of, and which will help you rise above the helplessness you're feeling.

The Germans have a word for it, thankfully; sehnsucht represents a profound feeling of longing, of perfecting the imperfect in life; a desperate yearning for a land far, far away, a land unlike any earthly domain with which we are acquainted.

It's still quiet outside. The puddles lie dormant; there's not even a ripple in sight. The trees stand still. The tiny dew drops scattered on the leaves and the gate glisten like stars in a forgotten universe. Somewhere in the distance, a stray dog lets out a long, shrill howl... and then silence engulfs the remainder of the night.

Maybe this feeling will go away after a while.