399: Woven Knight

Woven Knight

You are the ever-gladness of my everglades; my gratitude lifted from the waters of greenery; the etching of my soul made new. In you I see eternity; your eyes the light of my lantern, the cave to my longing. To glance but once is to see the distance song awoken, the beat of my heart renewed, the pavement marked with the blood of footprints red.

I follow, and I follow more. Your steps, my steps, your way my way, and reach to anchor what is me into what is you; forging through the sun-swept grasses to lead my soul within the trappings of kindness. If I could ascend, I would, my foot, my hand, like the climber upon the stronghold of rock, lingered there at the sandy-grip between my limbs; how I long to dive and slip into the places you are made, into the very start of your beginning; to see you form and bend in completion, to watch as witness as the light of my world is first sparked.

How glorious if I could be your maiden and set each braided dream upon your lap, as you, like the purest of daylight, move past my flesh, and penetrate me with the grandest of sweetness. I cannot but imagine how dreams become answer, how I become found, without the drumming of your castle, calling me forward, a lone soldier centered and marked, inching her way to the trumpets of your name.

I awake to the morning day, and yours is the face I see. I dance in the starlight, and yours is the wish I make. I mend my own existence with the remnants of your memory, waiting beyond the blindness of what can only be such bitter spell. My darling enveloped babe, I cannot but hope to be nothing less than your maiden, my kisses upon thy cheeks, thy lips, thy buried chest of grandeur. To whittle my fingers into bare bone, to make my flesh peel asunder, my eyes leap, my scars each burst renewed in the aching. For I would die for you a thousand deaths upon a thousand more, and ring my life around the circumference of your calling.

Take me as sweet river, my beckoning, the one that rushes through the caverns of my heart, rupturing as the gold dust glitters upon the landing. Am I but this remainder, this fragile broken shell, scattered on the endless shore, glistening in the break of day; my pieces fallen from the lost sky, my tears hidden in the lines of the encasement? Or am I true, the one formed with your first breath, moved by your ocean, chaliced view rendered through the breaking of bread of two; for you, my darling, my eternal lover of the ever-time, have with first step, with first entrance, with the ancient tumbling of my name, awakened the angel who slept in the shadowed swell. You in your mercy, in your truth, in your direction, have laid way for the dawn of passion so deep that the carving of universe would do no justice.

Can you not see how I love you? Can you not see how I wait within the waiting? How each day that grows becomes centuries spent? Each second a reminder of your destined departure? Can you not see me here, cradling you in your own goodness, lathering you in the light turned and aged as fruit rendered wine? How I carry you through the meadow beyond meadow, in the space of pure joy, and await your coming. For you are my mystery unborn, my dream unawakend, my precious feathered dove gently set upon my threshold; and though you hear me not, as I cry from the hallowed space of light, I shall guard thee in the blanketed folds of eternity, my wishing heart made whole, with the needle that threads through the layers of my woven knight.

388: Keepers of the Light

I invite you to listen to this song first.

I started singing You Light Up My Life, around the age of eleven. I think it was the only song I wrote down the lyrics to and memorized. That, and Away in a Manger. I used to sing songs at the tippy-top of my lungs, squeaking and squealing to anyone that would listen, including my downstairs duplex-landlords, who sometimes brought me indoors for cookies. I could tell when I sang, by looking in the observers’ eyes, that people didn’t think I sang super well or close to on key. I could tell they thought I was a lonely child searching for attention. I could tell that they were smiling in an attempt to help me feel accepted. But I couldn’t say all that. I didn’t think to say it. I didn’t know that everyone else, or most everyone else, didn’t think like me. I figured we all knew what was being unspoken. That we all just pretended we didn’t.

When I sang my heart out, I slipped into a fantasy world. I leaped across time and stood on stage. I imagined refuge in a bountiful light. I imagined being lifted and protected and seen. The song itself didn’t free me; nor did the audience observing. What freed me was the freedom I was—the capacity to be me. What trapped me was the realization that all about me others weren’t free.

There was a time where people approached me for my light. They were drawn to me. Something about me pulled them in. I know now it was and has always been Spirit. Then I did not know, and I didn’t wonder; I thought everyone had this; I thought everyone heard God and could see through people.

I remember going to the church around the corner, a Catholic cathedral where I never once attended mass. I was drawn there, at times, the little girl I was, with her un-brushed hair and with her big searching eyes. I would swing on the monkey bars in the church playground over and over, until my hands blistered. Then, if I hadn’t already entered, I’d walk quietly into the empty church and just breathe. I felt safe there. I felt connection. But I didn’t know why. The candles, the light of the candles, they spoke to me, as did the colors of the glass windows and the movement of sunlight through the grand space. I wasn’t frightened. I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t anywhere. I just was. Sometimes time stopped and I traveled into the future where I would walk in as full-grown woman and be, with the others, I would be.

I wasn’t a religious child. I wasn’t even spiritual. I was magical. I believed in magic everywhere. I believed everything, each and everything. I believed in everyone around me. And I loved everyone. I trusted them. I gave myself freely: my attention, my time, my love. I had an over-flowing abundance of love. And I was me. There wasn’t anything about me that I had created. I radiated from within.

Something about me, or perhaps something within me, gave me the incapacity to be anyone but me. This gift of being authentic was beautiful. But because I trusted and believed others so greatly and so freely, when they told me what they thought, I believed them. Because if they were beautiful and I loved them and they were perfect, then they must know, they must have the answers.

I believed when they, the others, told me that I was just a child and didn’t know things. I believed them when they said life was hard. I believed them when they cried and cursed what was wrong and unjust. I believed it all. And I began to see that I lived in a world entirely complex in its simplicity. I began to see that I held all the secrets of love and joy, but that none could see them. I knew how to laugh and how to make other people laugh; and I did so without intention or want; I just was joy.

Then came the passing of days, when I learned my joy was not enough. When I learned that my heart, no matter how big, could not make a difference—at least I thought. Soon as my friends grew older, they changed. Their views became more broken and fragmented, their opinions stronger, their hatred taking shape. Divisions were made, as I watched, fingers pointed, sometimes at me, but mostly at others. And everyone started playing this part that didn’t make any sense; except that their ways kept people, for the most part, in an imaginary role of control.

I began to see that love was divided and measured. I began to see that love came and went, as did people. I learned that love didn’t mean love; what some called love actually meant conditions and fleeting moments of spiked emotions of some sort that didn’t feel or look like love at all. I learned that whatever shape I took, I could receive part of this love, that wasn’t love. But since I couldn’t find the other love anymore, the one I held in the backyard during slumber parties and collected, as the others laughed with me, without cause or pause for judgment; since I couldn’t find that love anymore, I took what I could. It never felt right. It felt false from the start. It was false love created by my want for connection and the growing emptiness I had inside.

My actions seemed to define me. I seemed to become who people thought I was. It didn’t matter how much goodness I had inside me; no one could see it, unless they chose to. No one. And when they did think to see the goodness, it was because I emulated them; I showed them a part of themselves they liked, or wished to like. I showed a commonality or I complimented them by my presence or in my spoken words. I collected false-love this way: pretending to be who they wanted me to be in an attempt to connect. To say I played, would be false, as there was no joy in this. To say I fought, would be false, as there was no friction. It was a space and place that I am incapable of defining or marking. For how can I define a place in which everything was false—the only thing real my want to fill the emptiness of falsehood?

This falsehood permeated much of my life, far into adulthood. A falsehood that eventually blinded me as well, to my own inner light. I had to snuff my light to continue to exist. I was given no choice.

I had to extinguish who I was, if I ever wanted hope of connecting. At least this is what I conditioned myself to think. I learned to track the actions of another to determine my next move. I could tell from every flinch, every switch of voice, every motion. Responses were my indicators. Reactions my compass. I stopped feeling inside my own body. I became numb to my needs; everything was masked in my effort to predetermine how to respond to the responders. For I could see in their eyes the judgment, the dislike, the wondering. I could see so much that they wouldn’t ever say. Particularly their thoughts about me, or about the way they perceived me. I knew they thought what they dare not say. I knew there were all these connections going on just in seeing me. I was being categorized and dissected and figured out. It’s not that I thought I was that important, it was that I thought they were. I think all along I knew they were a reflection of me or at least a mirror to my own experiences. I knew we were one and the same, but didn’t know how to define the feeling. And so I would watch, until I laughed and joked, trying to squeeze the joy out of someone whom had seemed to forgotten where he or she put it.

Mine, my joy, was always there, right in me, never gone. Even with all the poured in sorrow, I had this joy. It was always growing and blooming. There was always hope. It seemed no matter how much the others responded in a way that carried the potentiality to sting like thorns, that I still kept my hope. There was this unstoppable faith. Something in that song about the light through the window, about the light itself; I knew this. I saw the light n my dreams and I heard light in the whispers. I knew my destiny. I knew my calling. But this too, I was often told was wrong. I was made in form divinely perfect, but undoubtedly I frightened people. And this brought me to a place of confusion, so very great, I dare not venture there even in thoughts and rememberings.

For how could I, one held by the angels and light, have been so terribly flawed? And why did all around me seem to be such blindness? I searched and searched as a child—in the trees, under the school buses, in the grassy fields—for reprieve. I slipped into my imagination. I hid in the shrubbery and shadows documenting my own thoughts. And I came to the conclusion I was someone made wrong; though even this, deep down I knew to be untrue.

In time, I learned to conform. I learned to tuck away the voice of truth and the rays of light. For I believed the misery of disconnection to be far worse than hiding my light. And so I hid, for a very long time. And though I was a keeper of the light, it dimmed.

And here the dark found me. So very freely, as if beckoned by the very ache of my soul. I walked forsaken to my self for decades. I learned, through my mind, to hear the lies before the truth. I heard the negative talk, and I collected this, for if I did not believe them, I could not be with them, and then I would have to be alone. In order to connect, I had to believe what others said about me. If I believed in my light and my angels, and in my very soul, than I would be without the company of humans. I would only have the invisibility of my hope and joy—and alone whom would I share anything with?

Eventually, the lies became my truth. My whole truth. I was what others created me to be. And then a shift happened, in which they were what I created them to be. I began to see like other people. I began to believe the lies. I began to think that yes, only my point of view counted. That yes, I am in control of my world. And yes, I am the most important and special. I began to be a love-leech collecting falsehoods. Love, love, love ME! I demanded. Love me through validation. Love me through listening. Love me through answering back how I expect and want you to respond. Outcomes became my life. Hope became my misery. I latched onto the yellow brick road of illusion. I thought, if I was just good enough, and right enough, and had all the answers I would WIN! I would be LOVED! This is what I was taught. This is what was walloped into me. This is what I ATE because nothing else was offered.

Until the pain of emptiness became so great that I knew I was wrong. I knew that life was not meant to be like this. I knew somewhere inside my little girl protecting the light was dying to come out.

For me this has been my greatest gift: my affliction.

My very agonizing pain was what set me free. The very discomfort that kept shouting within of the falsehood was my greatest joy. I was given a lantern since birth. And I walked four-decades pretending I was not, in hopes of gaining false love.

And now, as I step back, very much the little girl I was, with my lantern bright, I see I kept this light hidden for a purpose. I suffered for a reason. I suffered because everyone else was suffering. I didn’t retreat because I was so different after all. I just retreated a bit later along my path. I just retreated knowing I was retreating. There wasn’t anything different about me, except I was born awake. I was born with the affliction that is both my teacher and my cross to bear. I was gifted the wisdom at a young age, and through this affliction I was formed and made, through this affliction my lantern was fueled. I see this clearly, more clearly each moment I am here.

I see that we each have these lanterns, and that for some of us it hurts more to hide them. But we all have them. For some of us we know we are hiding them: this is the affliction.

I see now that I am struggling to turn up the lanterns of all, when all I need do is turn on my own.

In so many ways, in every way, I am that little girl, with her joy, with her lantern strong, standing on the hillside and beckoning my friends onward. Only this time I can see. I can truly see. I know now my once perceived greatest weakness is my greatest comforter. I know my need to be love, my need to shine, my need to be free is the only need I ever choose. I know that in my affliction I am made whole. I know that in my wholeness I honor each and every soul. For in the embracing of what has always been and shall ever be, I have embraced the world. I have embraced the light.

Related Post: Behind the Curtain

379: I am very saddened by the state of the world

I am very saddened by the state of the world. While I can only speak of the nation I occupy, I gather enough from others that similar events are happening globally.

No matter how long I live on this earth, I am continually confused by many people’s behaviors and actions. Manipulations, lies, and false-intentions aside, I am dumbfounded by the angry-hearts and finger-pointing souls.

It seems so obvious to me: don’t judge another until you have entirely looked at your complete self and accepted who you are, learned to love yourself, and made a vow to be the best person you can be.

And hopefully, by the way of nature, having been through that process, the ability to judge simply ceases. Therefore, I find myself in a quandary, as what I feel within borders much on judgment, though I hope it resembles in form more of a heartfelt discernment.

I watch all around, in this place I find myself a part of, and see people acting out of spite and bitterness. To me, this seems as children at play, individuals who have somehow never gained what some of us were naturally born with. So many walking blindly, a victim of their self-created unbridled passion, set upon a path of feeding the darkness more dark.

I am at a crossroad of self, in many ways looking back at where I have been, without harboring much thought or even intention. Neither am I looking forward. I have tossed away the childish ways of dwelling anywhere other than I am, but still the present lingers here and penetrates my being, reminding me of why, in the past, I so often chose the route of escape over living. And I cannot help but think that the gentle souls of the world continue to choose the same, to slip back into a part of self, where the light is pure and the surroundings safe.

My hope lies in the minority. For in them I see this endless river of kindness, acceptance, and genuineness. And there is where I choose to see my own reflection, in the soul inhabiting this lost planet, which continues to shine despite the glaring dark broadcasted by the deceitful and righteous ones.

I am by no means a religious scholar, but I have had my share of studies in theology. What strikes me as evident is that many religions and spiritual paths have the answers; they speak of not judging, not lying, not cheating, not stealing; they speak of detachment, release of the desire for material ways, and unconditional love. Yet, it seems, that still most of society is buzzing all around, hounded by some beasts, corralled in like sleeping sheep, and made to behave in ways that may not be notorious but are as equally damaging.

It seems I am made, as I be, to walk in this world half-blinded to the ways of the majority, left outside of the fenced-in and blinded, and watching from a hilltop wishing for my brothers and sisters to join me and step out of the illusion of hatred. I am made this forever minority, for separation seems the only prize over entrapment of soul.

Today, I do not choose to celebrate tragedy or turn a disaster into a false idol. I will not choose to share grotesque images, nor to splatter hearsay and falsehoods. I see no benefit.

Have we become a united people whom can only feel close when disaster strikes? If so, what then will keep the disaster from repeatedly happening? What if there was silence upon disaster? What if there was just support, love, protection and safety; and the rest, the disastrous aftershock of tragedy, the spawned pods of evil, were left behind—just dropped, just forgotten, or at minimum ignored. What would the dark broadcast then, and what would we hold onto?

There is a part of me that knows I would be better to release this, to let go of this pain, as I do the rest, to detach from the horrors before my eyes—the dark aftermath of disaster. To close my eyes as the wolves circle in tighter and tighter, the false prophets, of modern day, spinning their webs of deceit; our neighbors joining in the game of hatred and rebel, or perhaps shedding their own tears in the spotlight. See me—notice me—love me. Why not just claim you need attention without the façade of displaying a tragedy to bring you forward? And why spread images of hope or horror based on tragedy with your name stamped upon the photo; how obvious that this is a way of profiting from suffering, whether for self-attention or material gains.

I don’t understand how people can be blinded to their own motives and own intentions. How they cannot feel what they are doing. See how they are acting. And if they are aware, how they can continue forward. Who are these people, as I do not belong to them?

And for the ones gently retreating, doing their part to help in silent fashion, without want of recognition, without need to scream, what of their dear, dear hearts? Who are these ones who humbly serve? How I wish to join you in prayer or meditation, and walk in the light at your side.

I do not understand this world or my place in it. Existing here seems like living on a giant stage of fools, with everyone rushing to be seen and be recognized, everyone in this giant game of Monopoly.

I am deeply saddened, today. I am not sad entirely because of the events of the original disaster—I hurt for the families and the loved ones—but at the same time I recognize disasters happen all over the world. People die in horrific ways all the time. People suffer. People are beaten, tortured, enslaved, persecuted, starving, and so on. There is no shock to me when disaster comes—the only shock is when I see what should by now be familiar, the clamoring for attention, resurfacing of the dark feeding upon the dark, ways and means that remind me of how far we’ve yet to come.

I am sad mostly because I live in a society that has been in essence brainwashed, a place where people are bombarded with negativity and bred to believe in lacking, and behave as if in desperate need. If the world were a spinning top, and I were still child, I would halt the toy entirely, and just let the earth breathe, let the people step out of self and watch. How I wish people could see they are love, they are light, and not these false illusions they have claimed.

I sit here very much isolated, unable and unwilling to share in the masses way of being, unable to take part in a celebration of the darkness. It is like being made to sit in the coliseum of ancient Rome, whilst crying, when all about people are cheering. It is like, this agonizing grief, a singular one watching from a singular window, waiting for the world to stop.

374: Moments

“It is not that I am not present in the here and now; it is that I am so entirely present to the universe that I become intoxicated in possibilities and rapture, and self must retreat back to the echoes of my imagination in order to breathe.” ~ Sam, Everyday Aspergers

Moments

The moment when you know you’ve spoken your complete truth, whether it was a word or thought, and you sift through what you said, wanting to make sure there isn’t the splinter of doubt that you didn’t indicate anything other than truth, and you feel your stomach twist, because maybe, just maybe, somewhere inside of you, you were wrong.

The moment you speak your truth loudly and clearly, with extreme empathy and knowing, weighing the validity of your words with the interpretation of necessity, while fighting back the voices that analyze and dissect the coming unspoken that is surging its way out through your veins, as you question your need, your want, your intention, wondering if the silence will win out over the pulsating necessity to share.

The moment you risk for the higher good, knowing if you speak your mind that you shall be persecuted, ostracized, and judged, but knowing all the greater that you shall in speaking your light have conquered the darkness, at least a splinter of the darkness that permeates your world.

The moment you lie, only to protect the feelings of another, and you replay the falsehood over and over in your mind, a broken record that hurts your ears and leaves you suffering, not for the sake of another, but for the sake of going against your own self and truth, as you wonder if a better course could have been detected, discovered, and executed, something beyond the distasteful torture of falsehood.

The moment you realize no one has the answers, no book, no preacher, no teacher, no guru, absolutely no one, and that all of your efforts have led you back to self; only now you are carrying a giant book of something that resembles truth, but in actuality it is a drafted, desperately edited and marked up tablet stack of contrived and siphoned rules, many of which contradict, point fingers, and leave in the ring either victim or prideful one.

The moment you speak your truth and the others leave, except perhaps one that stays for analysis and judgment, or to set you straight; and you listen, trying your best to look like you are interested and are learning, as you bleed all over the sidewalk from the bitter and deceptive words, your heart only wanting love, acknowledgment, and acceptance, not to be told again how you don’t fit in, don’t have a right, or don’t understand.

The moment you realize you understand more about a topic than anyone in the entire room, but to say so would immediately set up barbwire fences of division; thusly, you keep quiet and nod, trying to ignore and not comprehend the analogies that go against the base foundations of truth, justice, and love, with your last hope being that someone, somewhere in the room is like you, sees the light in your eyes, and wishes to not push his belief system upon you, or prove to you his theory, or embrace you in his way of life, but only enters your space to welcome you unconditionally as another being of substance.

The moment you dial up a conversation, and with first word, the person on the other end begins the game, following the rules of conduct and behavior and asking you blank, empty questions, not caring, unattached, unwilling to connect or even listen, the shallowness of the encounter physically hurting your chest and making your heart weep, as you attempt to move through with your life-preservers of nodding and smiling, acting as if you are comfortable, while feeling the energy of the speaker pierce you like daggers: the tone of the voice, the inflection, the pauses, the drawn out non-silence that does not match who she is, what she is, and where she is going. You are merely a dancer in some line of communication, knowing not where to step or when to pause, trying not to step on toes, and staring at a blank empty face, whose only need is to check your name off of her list.

The moment the sun rises and your breath is taking away and you are dancing in the rays, your heart free, your child like nature set to the wind, spinning, leaping, abounding in spirit, without moving in inch; and wanting to share this experience, to share the opportunity of hope you see in nature, and in the dawning of a new day, you giddily laugh and celebrate and raise the arms to the magenta skies; only to discover the persons surrounding you can’t sense what you sense; and you think somehow you are made wrong, too attached, too intuitive, too knowing. And so comes the feeling of separation, the sun’s hues shifted, the day begun, with you lost to self, trapped within thought of why your way is not their way, and why your way is left out of the equation.

The moment you kiss another and you wonder what the kiss means, because it has to mean something; and you question how two could connect without connecting, touch without touching, and how the game of romance is only a game, marked with pitfalls and dungeons and war. How you have instinctively set up camp upon another’s territory and in so doing have been given a safe zone, in which you shall not tread outward; for in stepping out, you risk annihilation, alienation, and doom. You weren’t meant to spread across his land and place flags of declaration about your feelings or experience. You were built for silent torture as you sit spinning in your small space of reason wanting to scream out the ecstasy and dynamic shift of being, but forced to crease your edges, sew your own self shut and hide out until the coast is clear, or the being you so loved, simply slips away.

The moment you want to be present, but you can’t; and the guilt settles in as friend or child, spouse or son, he looks at you with wide open eyes ready to connect at his level, in a place of happiness and delight, without deep thoughts, without theories and strings of reason, without doubt, without prospect of future circumstances; and how you sit in this passing moment, longing to reach out and be this same way, to stop the clock of the own mind and silence the tick-tick-ticking; and so you pretend, you try, you harbor your very own secrets of misery; a false grin, a false laugh, an intense glance, all means in which you try to give back and let the other know he is loved and needed, even as your brain radiates outward, living in an imaginary land, pulling you back to a place so distant that all connection, all being is lost in a blink of letting go. To speak and be present, like the other, is to balance on the plank, with the sharks below, knowing without fail, you shall fall with a splash, that your eyes shall dim, your mind blank out, and you shall undoubtedly sink into the dark and murky depths, embracing the emptiness and cold, where once the potentiality for sharing, an open beckoning space with dear one, existed.

The moment you know you are different and you celebrate the uniqueness knowing you have a purpose and a bright light and that you will make a change in the world for the betterment; perhaps you feel enlightened, like a teacher or creator of beauty, or even like a semi-saint; but to speak this to the world would be the death of you, for others would claim you are self-centered, grandiose in thought, or egotistical; but you know deep down you are meant for greatness, even as you walk in a world that seemingly does nothing but dilute your own fuel to your own fire. You are passion, you are insight, you are intuition, and you are connected to the grand scheme of life; but to say so leaves you breathless and unsure of yourself, dipped in the pool of humility time and time again, only to be told you are wrong.

The moment you understand that you are only a perception of what people think of you, and that no matter what you say or how you get your point across that no one will see you other than how they choose to see you; that ultimately you are an island onto yourself with tourists that caravan by and wave but never set foot onto your sands. And so you stand, unmoving, shining your light, wishing upon the star, that feels more liken to friend than any other being you know, waiting for the day, when a brave one will enter, and join hands to the infinite beauty of you combined.

The moment you realize you are no one, but you are supposed to walk in the world as someone, a someone who acts a certain way, dresses a certain way, expects certain things; but you no longer expect anything and no longer know how to act, and stand on this endless stage watching the ones garbed in their costumes, refinery and fancy ways, and wonder where you are to stand, how you are to observe, and what you are to take in, if not the bewildered stares of stagehands, whom keep pointing and staring at your indecent and unpredictable ways. Where to walk. Where to move. Where to be—each become your questions, as the world moves onward to a beat you cannot hear and do not wish to hear.

The moment you realize you do not have a condition or a syndrome or a fault, but understand intensely people are trying to make you believe you do, trying so hard that they convince themselves they are this illusion of normal, and you are this jumbled mess of faults; only you see the truth. Your blinders have been removed. You march in the silence, the one not dictated and orchestrated by the misers controlling the masses. Your eyes have been made open. In essence you have been reprogrammed, the barrier of righteousness, to shine the light on falsehoods and bring out the truth; yet, no one knows this but the few others that see in truth; and thusly, you move forward half-blinded in lies and half-open to truth, stuck in a place of limbo, with something beyond the beyond, urging you forward through the life that seems not life.

The moment your hands hurt, your feet hurt, your eyes hurt, your heart hurts, but you can’t stop, because there is a force inside of you that burns so deeply that if you do not open the crevice to creativity and let the flames burst out, as dragon releasing delicate-rage, then you shall perish in your own internal war. And so you move, in whatever way called to move; your own self bleeding in the efforts, your own self lost in the time without time, sinking into the separate land where no one can see you move with the freedom of angels, and you cannot see where this world was that you were made to walk in. And here you breathe, inside the escape of freedom, where the others cannot reach in and pull you out, cannot shape you and make you, and tell you lies of whom you be and whom you are not. A place of refuge where you can meet your own maker, whether self, universe, or God, and sit there in your trembling awe.

The moment you can no longer stand being you, as the music never stops, the thoughts never linger, but leap and bound across eternity, bringing up the genius of the world and making you into a spinning top of fury-making; when even the sound of the silence singes your ears and stops your heart, so that you want to scream at the annoyance of the drumming universe, though none around you can hear the pounding. And you cringe and cry and rant and plead, exploding inward as much as outward; for you have been placed in a merry-go-round of havoc with blind-seekers, each dumb and deaf, and wishing you were something other than your own self. And you have no way, no thread, no line of communication in which you can explain how you are the one displaced, removed from where you belong, and brought down to be tortured by the nonsense. How you have all the answers within, but are continually haunted and stopped in your making and doing, when the others, who know you not, shun and persecute your actions. Can they not see you are only trying to be, and that the more they stomp on your beingness the more they push you back into the dungeon of no recourse but explosion? Why do they force their ways upon you, when they, in their infinite blindness, know not what they do.

The moment you recognize you are not alone, that there is at least one other person like you on the planet, and you recognize their heart, their purity, and their need to make a difference; and in seeing her fully, you fill her with hope, because she knows at last you believe her and you trust her; because, contrary to what she has been told, she is not pretending to be kind, she is not pretending to be generous, nor is she pretending to love. She does love you, with all of her being, with all of her heart. And like your lonely, forlorn and forsaken self, you long to scoop her up and paint her in your compassion and security, to blanket her in your own goodness, and let her know she is this thing called beauty; she is this joyous light.

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(I wrote and pulished the post 373 (Semi-Saint) yesterday, knowing I might receive some backlash and that some individuals would choose to stop following my blog. I had a choice: to be authentic or to pretend. Today I understand that I needed to feel the suffering of rejection and judgment, in order to feel humbled, and to feel the collective pain of isolation. As odd as this seems, I need the suffering. I need to be connected to the others that still hurt. I don’t want to feel healed and complete (yet); and it seems at this moment, I cannot feel healed and complete, until every last brother and sister feels loved and accepted. For how can I walk in this world in a state of contentment, when all about me I see suffering? I know there is a way; I know I will realize this. A way to love my neighbor intensely without feeling his suffering, but I have yet to find it; and so I choose to walk beside the pain, until He has taught me all I need to see.)

368: Dream a Dream

I sometimes dream of the maroon Mazda GLC (Great Little Car) compact car I drove when I had just graduated high school—the very first vehicle I owned. Last night the car appeared, all dressed in his muted reddish-tones, still working, and still pulling me through my subconscious. We arrived in a mall parking lot, him looking auspicious, but me thinking he was running on empty, or at the very least stripped, undesirable, old, and worn out. He took no note of my emotions; like an unattached vessel he was used to getting me from here to there. I found a spot in the crowded parking lot at the side of the mall. It was mid-afternoon, with the sun in the air, but a sense of evening setting soon. I don’t remember saying goodbye to the car, or even where I parked; only that suddenly I was entering through the tall glass doors of the shopping center. I hadn’t given a second thought to the car or where’d I left it, or how long it would be there; I was too focused on my destination and some purpose that led me on like a star dancing just out of reach.

Inside the mall, I walked a short distance before turning left. My gait was at ease, my mind relaxed. There wasn’t need to rush or plan, or even focus. I approached a room and found myself inside a banquet hall full of graduates, mostly, perhaps fresh out of college or graduate school. I was part of the celebration, but entirely separate, not really seen or noticed, but included nonetheless. People were smiling, chatting, even planning. I was more of the observer: both invisible but present.

I left the gathering with a sensation inside of me that indicated I period of completion; I had attended the celebration not because I had to or had wanted to, but because I was drawn to. I hadn’t remembered being invited or previously being aware there was such a banquet. The crowd dissipated and I was neither left alone or isolated—I just was.

I walked on, inside this gigantic mall, the ceilings quite high and filled with shops and the airport above on the second-level. There was noise, people moving about, a few handsome men I can recall, and me thinking: If I bump into him on accident we can connect. Why didn’t I ever think to bump into people before? Why do I still feel the need to be noticed?

I continued on the main floor and glanced down at a watch, which was somewhere and nowhere, existing without existing; it was a little past four in the afternoon, and on reflecting on the time, I thought: Good, just enough time to get upstairs to the airport to fly to New York. And then, as soon as I’d thought that, an inner voice chimed in: Wow, that was cutting it close, maybe you should have allowed for more time, with your flight being at 4:45 and all.

I smiled and headed toward the airport terminal; until, after a few steps later, I realized I’d come empty-handed—I’d forgotten my suitcase. I turned then, searching the mall for the exit and walked swiftly towards the doors. My mind began to race, but I reassured myself, while calculating the time, that even with a quick stop outside to retrieve my luggage, I would make the flight.

Once outside I scanned the parking lot. I saw the line of trees that appeared to be the same line of trees near where I had originally parked. I scanned the rows, some five or six thick, with multiple rows in far-reaching directions leading out parallel and perpendicular. I knew my car was parked in a similar place, something like this at least, but I had no indication of where to walk. I knew to the right was too far, the place beyond the trees sparse, with the lot partially empty. I knew the place to my left to be too far the other direction, as I’d not walked that far to the mall door. I moved briskly down the five or six rows, not yet nervous, but with a burning gnawing sensation building up inside. Soon, the first element of doubt was born and my mind began the race, as if on seeing my own self lost the first shot had been fired. I worried now, the tension building, and the time seemingly building itself as a pressure upon my shoulders. How would I make my flight, if I couldn’t remember where I left my vehicle and retrieve my luggage?

Down the end of one row, on the left, was a car that matched mine almost exactly, only it shined more and appeared newer; I was almost certain I’d left my car facing the opposite direction. I approached, peered inside, and noted the interior was different, some papers, almost like a map sprawled out on one of the chairs, the inside cleaner and crisper. I opened the front passenger-side door anyway, hoping by some chance this car was my car, even though I knew this to be an impossibility. Upon swinging the door out, a bell chimed and a masculine computer voice spoke. The words indicated I didn’t belong to this car and to proceed onward. The voice made no indication of judgment, but even so there seemed to be an underlying, unspoken echo of laughter. Perhaps a chuckle of forbidden-knowing, like a parent watching a toddler open yet again the drawer he ought not touch.

I realized then, as I walked away from the car that I was in the wrong place. That I had no idea where my car was, and that it was a strong possibility I would miss my flight. I panicked some, and searched frantically for the place I’d last seen my car, and with no luck in finding what I was seeking, I hunched my shoulders and pattered back toward the mall, feeling both sorry for myself and angry at myself, and very much alone. A few older ladies, white-haired and plump, were entering their own car; as I approached the end of the aisle, most of the cars behind me, they asked: Why are you so upset? And I tried to explain. They instantly expressed no concern, and found my dilemma rather ridiculous. For here I was planning a trip and they had their own worries that were much more pertinent and important than some destination of flight. Why did my silly trip matter when so much was happening in their own lives?

I shrugged and carried myself onward, feeling heavy and burdened in thought. Entering the mall I approached a man and asked where to go to find the banquet room. I figured if I could find the banquet room where the mall journey first began, I could find the original exist I entered through, which would lead me back to the parking lot and my car. The gentleman pointed to the left, and so I turned, finding only more stores and no banquet room. I returned to the main part of the mall, knowing there was a good chance I would never make my flight, calculating the time, the cost, the potential outcomes of missing the trip. Another person gave me directions. This time I was told to: Turn right and then turn left and go down to the first floor. I looked at him bewildered: But this is the first floor, I thought. He took no notice of my concern and just guided me with his eyes and pointing hand. It’s to the right and then down to your left, I am certain, he offered. I followed his instructions and sure enough there was a room, but I knew instantly it was the wrong room. The space was marked “Theater”—it was a stage for performers, a place I had left long ago and had no desire to return to. I couldn’t see the stairs leading down, and so I assumed the stage itself must descend.

I thought to myself: how silly to have even parked in the mall parking lot, and to leave my vehicle unattended for so long. Would it not be abandoned and alone when the night came to pass and the rest drove home. Would it not just stick out then to be found by robbers and thieves?

I mourned over the loss of my car, as thoughts of failure and further isolation submerged, most of the iceberg of wounded self now surging upward through the icy-cold waters of forsaken.

I left now, completely beside myself, close to hysteria, and found myself sobbing on an outside stairwell. Someone approached and handed me a phone. On the other end of the line there was a guiding voice—albeit an unattached, very much removed guiding voice. I explained my predicament, my fear of missing my flight, my incapacity to find my luggage, the consequences of my circumstance. The voice on the other end listened. And he answered without much pretense or concern: Why not take the flight and purchase new garments when you arrive?

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In reviewing this dream, I know the car was the “old” me, the way I chose to move through the world. I recognize I mourn this part of me; even though the vehicle was older and perhaps sluggish, and lacking luster, it was still my mode of transportation. The car holds the luggage I carried with me, the necessities I think I need—my cloaks/costumes, my way of being, what is familiar and known. In searching for the car, I have lost the car, primarily because the car no longer exists and really never existed. I am worried of what will become of myself.

The gathering in the banquet room and the people in the mall are all symbolic of the other travelers in life that I see around me but feel disconnected with. I love them, I admire them, I even want to bump into them, if not for connection than for direction. I am searching for myself in others, searching for guidance, and understanding. And although no one shuns me or judges me, I am in essence invisible, there but not, moving through the world unnoticed.

The only moments I do connect are when I am in my state of sorrow and panic; here in my sadness about taking flight and finding my way out of being lost strangers will listen, but they will not understand or take interest. They are focused on their own life. No one feels what I am feeling, and whether outside the mall or inside the mall, I am lost. I am surrounded by everyone and no one. The stage is symbolic of where I used to be. The place I acted and performed. This is no longer my destination; neither is the banquet room of celebration. I have moved beyond celebration and pretending, and I am ready to journey onward. However, I think I must find the old me and follow the old ways to move forward. I am lost both inside the mall and outside the mall, in a place of limbo, searching everywhere and ending up nowhere; by entering a stairwell, I am at my last stop, not in the parking lot and not in the mall. Here in a place that doesn’t belong to either world, I realize that the answers are not found in the ways of the old or the ways of the new.

The only answers are to be found in letting go of my past ways and letting go of my search. By risking flight without the answers, I shall find the answers.