The Night the Stars Went Out

On a night when the heavens wore a shroud of despair,
The moon stood alone, a sentinel bare,
The sky, once a canvas of shimmering light,
Now swallowed by darkness, devoid of its might.

Whispers of wonder swept through the town,
As children looked up, their faces turned down,
“Where have they gone?” they asked with wide eyes,
The stars, once their friends, now lost to the skies.

The elders gathered, their brows furrowed deep,
In the silence of night, they struggled to keep
The tales of the cosmos, the myths of the past,
But the stories felt hollow, the shadows were cast.

A mother held close her child to her chest,
“Fear not, little one, for we’ll find our rest,
In the warmth of our hearts, in the love that we share,
Though the stars may be gone, their light lingers there.”

The lovers walked hand in hand, searching the void,
For the constellations that once they enjoyed,
“Do you remember,” one whispered, “the wishes we made,
Under the blanket of stars, where our dreams were laid?”

But now in the stillness, the wishes felt lost,
As they wandered through darkness, counting the cost,
Of a world stripped of wonder, of magic and grace,
In the absence of starlight, they searched for a trace.

The poets and dreamers, with hearts full of fire,
Sought meaning in shadows, igniting desire,
“To write of the night,” one declared with a sigh,
“Is to capture the essence of what makes us cry.”

They penned down their thoughts, their fears and their hopes,
In the ink of the night, where imagination gropes,
For even in darkness, a spark can ignite,
A flicker of courage, a glimmer of light.

The children, undaunted, began to create,
With chalk on the pavement, they drew their own fate,
A galaxy sprawling, with colors so bright,
In the heart of the night, they painted their light.

And as the hours passed, the world held its breath,
In the stillness of absence, they pondered on death,
Yet in every heartbeat, in every soft sigh,
They found that the stars were not lost, but nearby.

For the stars live in stories, in laughter and tears,
In the bonds that we forge, in the love that endears,
Though the sky may be empty, the universe vast,
The light that we carry will forever hold fast.

So on that dark night, when the stars went away,
The people discovered a new kind of sway,
In the dance of their spirits, in the warmth of their souls,
They learned that the darkness can also make whole.

And when dawn finally broke, with a soft golden hue,
They looked to the heavens, and there, shining through,
Were the stars, reemerging, as if to proclaim,
That even in darkness, we’re never the same.

For the night that the stars went out taught them to see,
That hope is a beacon, a light that can be,
In the hearts of the dreamers, the lovers, the wise,
The stars may go dim, but their spirit never dies.

- Khushi Kaul