The labyrinthine mind is dark, dark, and ghosts
and monsters lurk in its secret chambers, sneaking
up on you with blood-thirsty menace, or else
sheltering maliciously in place, waiting to pounce
at any unknowable instant. But if an earthquake
comes and shifts its foundations, leaving a little
fissure where the light suddenly manages to penetrate
into the dark world, you should move toward the light,
not slide back deeper into darkness, crouching down
and frozen in fear of new possibility, in love
with neurotic terror for its terrible familiarity.
It's always death or change in this world, in this life,
death or change, and the choice is there,
the choice remains. The challenge is always
dredging up the courage to cross the secret,
newly-revealed threshold that you never imagined
could exist, or that you could ever find. And then,
suddenly. . . .there it is! And your terrorized mind
wonders: how long will the portal remain open?
A secret passage to another series of brand new
worlds lies exposed before your cautious feet. . . .
The labyrinthine mind grows up like poisonous,
thorny vines over years of inaction, obscuring
the self-image and over-whelming all one's
best dreams if you let it. So when earthquakes
come and light spills in, do not let these fleeting
moments pass you by. Crossing the threshold,
you know your old self must perish as a new self's
new-born, and that sounds scary, sure, but it's
just another way of growing up, and trust me,
trust me, it'll turn out fine.
20090725
Threshold Dweller
Copyright © 2009 Ernest Bloom.
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I enjoyed the parallel of the mind to a sort of mythic labyrinth where Minotaur-like monsters dwell and lurk- not bad metaphors there. The descriptions were vivid enough to grasp my imagination.
ReplyDelete"The labyrinthine mind grows up like poisonous,
thorny vines over years of inaction"- here you repeat the theme but even further emphasize the potential dangers inherent in the mind and its universal tendencies- the demure qualities that make a stone of so many us beings born to fly the skies and cosmic star-studded expanse.
I was moved by the ending lines, the direct statement to the reader- very convincing. I might just take you up on that advice.
a dash of psychology, a pinch of philosophy, a little mythology sprinkled here and there. we are a series of distinct individuals who have crossed various thresholds, one dying so the next can be born. birth's usually a difficult and painful process, no matter how obvious in retrospect.
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