Beautiful anonymity.
That’s what I’m feeling.
The sense of being one with the night, the plunk of rain,
Muted cricket symphony fills my inner ear,
The magical quiet of aloneness.
With nowhere to go and nothing to do.
Freedom bathed in cosmic love.
The joy of breathing in a body.
The ecstasy of communion with life.
Still in the cocoon.
Not finished yet.
I don’t know what drew me here. Something mysterious. Maybe the
specter of death? That breathing presence behind me? It doesn’t
feel like anything that benign or cosmic. I think it’s the constant fear of being criticized. I can’t say “no hope, no fear” in my personal
relationships. I’m always afraid I’m
going to be accused of breaking some social rule. Like in high school. Some rule I didn’t agree to. Some rule I didn’t even know about.
A friend pokes me with her sword from time to
time, as if my amorphous mass of feelings and thoughts aren’t enough – or aren't inviolate. I’m always slightly horrified and guilty to
be awakened from my beautiful slumber – that crucible or slurry of dreams and
portents never far from my consciousness.
I wanted to write about this. And about missing my soulmate. Not him the person but him the presence –
my lover in the ethers. Where is he now,
and who is he now? Is he happy? Is he safe? I reach out with my timeless love and invincible care.
I leave a fingerprint just to mark my place, with an old sketch when I was creating affirmations to prod me into making art, like a frog being pushed by its fond parent to slide into the pond and kick. You don't know you can swim until you try. Now that my memoir is out in the world, I feel like that frog, slowly floating down while the fragments of lilies and minnows settle around me.
The fog of colors has bright edges
In clearly delineated fragments of memory
Like friendly snapshots come to call.
In my early days they were paintings
Rivalling Rembrandt and Rousseau
Phantasmagorical dioramas.
I learned a new word today – aphantasia
For the loss of that clarity,
That magical realism.
Was it the head trauma
Of a shattered browbone
Or a desire to blanket the moments of disaster?
Did the cheekbone collude with the
Eye socket and ravaged jaw
To let those nerve endings die without rebirth?
It helps to have those bright fragments
Outlining the mysterious fog
And the occasional vivid dream.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Aphantasia is the inability or difficulty to voluntarily generate visual mental imagery. It can be caused by genetics, brain injury, neurological issues or psychological trauma in some cases. The image shown is my surrealistic painting of a woman in Mcleod Ganj, northern India.
