My Parallel Self

By Gaurav Sudhakar Patil

Scene 1: The First Meet

Far from a distance came friend of mine

He looks, how I look

His walk? Like mine

He speaks, how I speak

All the similarities at their peak

Far from a distance came friend of mine

No arguments, we are the same

What is the difference, no one can claim

He then spoke, the mystery resolved

“I am from here, where you are from

It’s just that they never react

Our universes parallelly exist and act

It’s not just me it’s almost the same

In the two universes in this game”

“But careful! don’t touch me the constituents are different

Hidden is a curse in what looks radiant

There’s expected a twist in all this similarity

You touch me and we all go into a singularity”

Scene 2: The interview

We sit in a corner, we start the chat

While I keep assuring myself every now and then

That it is for real, not a dream I am looking at

And this is how “the interview” began

I ask him what job he does

“I am a theoretical physicist”, he goes

“I work on bridges connecting parallel universes

And as an hobby, I go on finding such doors”

“Your workplace?” “Cornel”

“Alma mater?” “TIFR”

That was enough my eyes got tears

For he is living the dream, my heart still bears

I now ask about her

“Is she with me, there? Unlike here”

He seemed confused, said never heard the name

Was proposed by a girl, married to her instead

Hearing the name I couldn’t help but blush

The girl he mentioned was my first college crush

To add further, I could only say, “Are you sure?”

Despite so many similarities

The whole story differs

Just a single of all possibilities

Makes a different universe

Let us talk science now, “How did you get here?

Are you saying that, you found the door?”

“Yes”, he said and added further with a smirk on his face

“Just like the one we saw in the Loni village fair.

That big round gate, and that lightning pair.”

Till this moment, the story was nice

But now my fate had one more surprise

What was pleasant at first,is now a heavy task

Gathering some more courage, I now ask

“How could you know of that day dear?

How could you know of my biggest nightmare?”

“For that’s what happened to both of us

We that day swapped our universe(s)

In our fourth, in that year

I went to your place and you… You came here”

Shocked was I, I could only say

“Are you… Are you sure?”

By Gaurav Sudhakar Patil