In that vast desert that stretched beyond horizon,

I stood looking up to the starry night sky.

Though the cold winds caressed my face,

I started burning from within. 

I looked up to the stars and smiled,

Hoping that the wisdom of the sky would heal me,

And make me feel safe from the tyrannies of the world,

Before the raging heat burns me to the ground.

I closed my eyes as my flesh caught fire,

I contemplated the wonders of cosmic vastness,

Ignoring the pain of my flesh turning to ashes,

With resolve to be reborn wiser and stronger.

My fragile frame turned to ashes, and there was total silence,

No sensory input, no chatter of mind, no pain of the past,

I had breached the constraints of spacetime,

I saw everything that was, is and would ever be!

I spiraled back in time, fourteen billion years to the past,

I witnessed the Big-Bang and the creation of spacetime,

I watched in wonder the primordial plasma forming Hydrogen atoms,

Which formed the massive hydrogen clouds that spanned across many light years!

I watched in awe as gravity condensed the hydrogen clouds,

Forming numerous stars, galaxies, blackholes and wormholes.

Hiding its mysteries under the veil of dark matter and dark energy,

Forming more stars, planets, quasars and pulsars.

With joy, I watched the budding of conscious life,

The portals, through which the universe sought to see itself.

I saw life forms taking birth, flourishing, and perishing,

In the myriad corners of the cosmic vastness.

I watched intelligent civilizations like that of humans,

Rising to power, conquering their own planets and beyond,

Taking pride in their conquest of the nature,

Only to be crushed to extinction by the ruthlessness of time.

I meditated on the fragility of our existence, 

In this unfathomable magnanimity of the Cosmos,

I was humbled to know that we are here only for a speck of time,

And that all our conquests mean nothing in the cosmic scale.

And from that awareness, from that cosmic wisdom,

My flesh started reforming, leaving the ashes of past below,

And I found myself reborn with wings of fire,

While the stars smiled down to me with zest.

Humbled and reborn by the cosmic wisdom, standing on the ashes of past,

Knowing that I was free to craft my own meaning to this speck of time,

Remembering that I am the legendary Phoenix the ancients foretold,

I stretched my wings and rose to the sky!