the world is yours and yours only

By Amirah Datwani

the day you were born, you made history. the phenomenon is hardly a mystery. you think about it a lot, though. your mind wanders between your many meals at coffee shops and bistros, because for a nanosecond, you were the youngest person in the world. a precious, innocent thing, unafflicted by a single scar or burn. the existentialist brain cannot let that go. your introduction to the universe is immortalised in a photo. why isn’t it worth half the earth, a rare, exclusive picture of a miracle’s birth? you were smooth and soft, and just for a moment, you were the poster child of everything perfect, because the second you took that first breath, you replaced a life, you wiped away death. and your screams and cries didn’t yet drive your parents into desperate yells. no, they were too proud of themselves for bringing to the world a human not yet condemned to hell. when you come into the world, you set a record, then it’s ripped from your hands before you can collect your medal. the world is yours and yours only, until everyone moves on to the next person who’s made living a little less lonely. but for a brief moment in the passage of time, i did not belong to the universe. the universe was mine.

Rationale: A poetic prose piece about the fascinating idea that everyone was once the youngest person in the world, that everyone has made history without even realizing it, and how every single human being has changed the world.