Metaphor: noun
2. something used, or regarded as being used, to represent something else; emblem; symbol.

Poetry: noun
1. the art of rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts.

To ponder: our waves of senses of sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing allow us simply to experience reality, as it were, through metaphor and poetry. Not as it is. “We” cannot become something else, someone else, nor even our past or future selves. The paradox of identity is that in order to experience who we really are (the universe, eternal, etc) we must learn that our senses are by nature figurative and intoxicating. It has nothing to do with the amount or frequency in which we indulge.

The tragedy exists even at rest; at rest is the opportunity to become sober, to be free of inertia and let balance be, rather than waiting, bracing for balance to balance you or trying to balance yourself.

I surrender.

Being in the dark,
yet claiming,
believing the light is all around them,
that they blaze with light.
That they are on the right side.

Are you tiptoeing through darkness?
Are you thankful for every footstep?
Are you kicking, not knowing
who else you end up hitting in the dark?
How do you know what you hit is an enemy?
It is dark!

It is easy to navigate in light.

The door is locked and yet
we are ready to try to kick it down,
kick it in, rather than wait for a key
to be handed to us, or for someone
on the other side to open it–even if
we injure or destroy what is on the other side
What a strange behavior!
Take your time.

It sometimes takes a lifetime
to realize that the door itself
is the gift and the understanding.

If you try to break it,
you lose an opportunity to grow,
to lay down a burden,
to stop being on duty.

What ever else is beyond that door is immaterial.
We’re already,
ALREADY
on both sides of it.

We just had no idea.