Outwitted
He drew a circle that shut me out -
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout
But love and I had the will to win
We drew a circle and drew him in.
-- Edwin Markham
The walls of human understanding have various purposes, textures, designs. But their intent is often to keep something--a person, a mental state, a group, an idea, a dogma, religions and spiritualities--safe from challenge and on-going discovery of the truth of inherent polarity. It's not that what the wall is protecting is not-true. Both the wall and the wall-challenger have aspects of the truth, as truth is not unilateral. It is this-and-that. When this-and-that are mixed up in a fine stew it can be called wisdom. And from wisdom comes compassion.
Collage done in May 2009
She says:
you're out of bounds
out of grace
out of luck.
I think:
what the @#$%?
Am I different than
I've ever been
just because the Question
has come to life through
my cracked vessel of a voice?
Love says:
Down, girl.
Small thinking is just big thinking
with the wrapper still on.
Responding in kind is not kind.
I say with my feet:
Call me fool
because I am that.
But
Heart cannot be co-opted
to live in a place
once cozy
now
grown too small.
However,
if you'd like to come
visit for a cup of tea
in my new digs,
delight in
a laugh and
some bread, cheese and wine,
what's the harm?
Fire in the holy of holies
burns while I
beat out the rhythm
of my welcome
bare-footed
open-hearted.
*Hegel's dialectic: as a thesis arises it is met with its polarity/antithesis; synthesis is birthed in conjunctio or the 'this AND that' mentioned above. Synthesis in turn becomes the new thesis, only to be met by antithesis..and its 'deja vu all over again'. This dialectic has been such a helpful construct for understanding how things work. It has led me to the place where the instinct and impetus for pre-emptive destruction for the purpose of renewal is part of the warp and woof of my being. "If the thesis is firmly in place, let's begin to anti-thesize it, and get on with it! There's synthesizing to be done, already. Burn, baby, burn."
Thanks to the hardly fledgling Fledgling Poet for this week's One Single Impression prompt: walls
Follow the link to experience a variety of responses to this prompt.