emerging, alone, from the darkness

alone in the darkness. illusory - this solitude. and - all the while - my lucidity regarding said illusion remained clear and strong. still, an immense and incredibly powerful and extremely debilitating sense of sorrow - grief, intense grief - settled upon my soul. and paralyzed my spirit. much the same way a tiny spot of dampness renders an fresh bag of brown sugar inert and impenetrable. like that. i could not enter myself. i could not extract myself. trapped - this self of mine - beneath a thick, icy layer of flaming and poisonous grief.

cuddly as a jellyfish. that's how martin described me late thursday evening when i began to emerge from the grip of the devil of darkness that lurks within me. we laughed. and now i have yet another clever and descriptive phrase to ad to my bylines! and, i do no feel ashamed to admit its true. 'cuddly as a jellyfish.'

once again, i released myself from the darkest grips of that devil that lurks inside my soul. but, fools yourselves not! s/he always resides close @ hand. ever close. ever longing. ever restless. indeed, susan - its like having the devil inside you. and you know? sadly, i have grown to believe that it never goes away. that, those of us who house this devil ... must learn to balance its demands with the rest of life for ... all of this earthly existence.



i have spend my time cut off from the collective energy source called the internet contemplating death, life, knowing.

death & life - i wonder - have we got it all wrong? does artificial extension of life really honour its sacredness? what if we have ignored g-d's call for a soul? what if we have extended some lives beyond their ethereal purpose? what if ....? we have not heard g-d's call? because we have busied ourselves too much with our own call? what if ...?

death and dying - what has occurred to many of you only in light of baron's untimely death has rattled around in my heart and soul for a while now - for many years, in fact. the humbling reality of mortality. ours - humanity. for each of us - the end could come at any time. how do you really know you will see that buddy again? or your son, daughter, husband? you don't really. you just develop a certain amount of complacency to hopefully obscure the discomforting sorrow of reality. one never knows. death comes. she does not discriminate. at times we can cheat her - but only @ some expense, the cost of which will only become apparent much later down the time line of our existence. do not mistake this doomsayer-ish-ness for the nihilism of depressive thinking. its not. its a realization of the sorrow that plays a role in the circle of life. humanity likes to deny death. in doing so, we deny life. in doing so, we kill with abundance.

knowing - so few of us really possess knowing. i mean, really possess it down to our viscera, feel it boiling in our very bone marrow. many of us think we know ... oh so much more than we do. 'ignorance is bliss.' true - this old adage, in a surreal sort of way. i think, when one really submits oneself to the humbling reality of the delicate mortal finiteness of existence on earth, one cannot help but feel a constant twinge of sorrow for what loss exists somewhere in the moment. forget not, dear reader, that the circle of life continues to spin - whether pride and fear obscure your view of said wheel or not.

we think ourselves so smart. yet - we do not know. the birds know. the trees know. the grass knows. the magnolias and the cherry trees know. the willow trees know. the hyacinths, the tulips and the daffodils know. the see knows. and it waits, so patiently. the mountains, brood in their knowing. and still, we do not know. those of us that do know - that feel this ancient, silent, mystical knowledge brewing in our very bone marrows - we bear the label unstable, odd, eccentric, mentally ill, even.

i know. i feel this knowledge boiling in my blood. a silent, constant knowledge. it cannot speak as loudly and forcefully as power, or glamour, or ego, or vanity. it cannot speak that language. the knowledge i feel speaks a silent, ancient and enigmatic dialect. it takes gentle patience and solitude of self to decipher its code. its a labour of love. and a life long work in progress.

~here's a poetic musing of our long walk in the sunshine~

an honour guard of grand old cypress and pine trees
protect the dead from the living
an explosion of verdant textures, shades and blooms
tickle my senses
out of the corner of my eye - a late bloomer -
a surreal sepia image - a suspension of time and space:
a young tree, with delicate chestnut buds
and a strange patch of dessicated, pale brown leaves
a chorus of ravens serenades us with their stuttered
and angular sounding spring melody
the sparrows, the starlings -
the blossom-scented breeze carries their songs, too.
its raining the loveliest kind of rain shower
any princess could have on a warm, sunny day -
a delicate and steady shower of the tiniest pink blossom petals.
i breathe. deeply.
i inhale. inspiration.
i exhale. more inspiration.
i live. deeply.
intensely.
down to the cellular level.
i live.
what a gift i possess.
life.
and what a grace -
to know.