In this world with a million illusions, everyday seems to be an echo of what has already happened.  The naïve cackle of a child learning to walk can take you back a few thousand years ago to a time when civilization was beginning to feel its own presence. The human race was treading forward, hands outstretched with a desire to touch the sky. Like the unnamed young man from Shakespeare’s Sonnets, life was lost in the glory of its fair youth. His resolve unwavering, the man pushed forward taking in stride the guilt from his mistakes and sudden epiphanies which illuminated the path for him. From the snow encrusted birch forests to the sweltering sands of Sahara, everywhere it was the celebration of the new. It was probably under the shadow of a half finished sphinx or in the ruined alleyways of Pompeii, the earliest intellectuals decided the course of humanity. The unknown artists whose creativity still adorns the caves of Altamira were probably among the first of the breed in which belonged Michelangelo and Picasso. Violence has always been a constant companion of time. The many faceless generations that got slaughtered by the mob each century have left their bloodied footprints on the sands of time. The wails of countless spirited souls burnt in the stake or the swish of the guillotine blade brought into life the sparks of revolution. The banished returned, only to be locked up in the invisible cage of self righteousness. The sense of arrogance that comes with power makes history repeat itself time & again. The unending cycle of rulers becoming slaves and slaves becoming rulers discreetly helps monarchy and slavery to flourish. It isn’t true that man didn’t know his psyche before Freud pointed it out but was gleefully oblivious by his own choice. Caught amidst the never ending debate between right, left and center we tend to forget about right and wrong. The countless conflicts over religion, ethnicity and country rages on, never pondering for a moment before adding pseudo to the word secular or justifying a massacre. We seem to never understand that the various ideologies that we have coined actually limit us in life. History observes closely, from the high altitudes of Machu Picchu it watches the tigers slowly being poached into extinction. The remnants of the ancient library of Nalanda lament the burning of books by fanatics. The scattered ruins of the Bamiyan Buddhas can do nothing but shudder at the sight of people killing in the name of religion. The icy blizzard that blows in the snow clad peaks of Alps tries to assert itself with blank words of self assurance in the wake of global warming. They wait patiently, for us to become history.