The Illusion of Self



Over fifteen months since her death and why have I not died? Why cannot I die as she died? Is it that I lack, lacked, the courage to bring forth life's end, or - more truthfully, perhaps - that I, despite so many mistakes, my so many peregrinations this past year or so, still cling to a strand, many strands, of self-worth, of that illusive-self which brings and which brought so much suffering?

I do not know, but feel I know - and the tears of the night's anguish have dried, here, as the almost Equinoxal September Sun rises, warm, and the grass and ferns of this wooded clearing give up their slight misty vapour which rises slowly to briefly swirl to be gone while a few tuneful birds call and sing in the bushes and trees around.

No breeze beneath the clear sky-blue, and - for a moment - there is a joy seeping into my being as the warm rays of the rising Sun seep into hands, face. Nearby, the young Ash trees rustle as a Squirrel branch-crawls then jumps to jump again, tree to tree, as a few midges rise to fly then spiral between the dew-flecked webs among the grass. No flies, yet.

In the distance, on or below the slopes of this wooded hill, a shotgun sounds - one blast, then two, breaking this so natural silence. So there is death there, somewhere, once again, as the warmth builds and the first Fly of the morning, warmed, buzzes past as they, such beings, buzz past in that living which is their living.

So who am I who in my living was this person, then that, who supported "this", then "that"? Who am I that such empathy then such annoyance then such reaction to dishonour lived within to bring so many, sometimes too many, questions and so much living that at night or in day I could lie or sit dreaming, remembering, so replete with so many satisfying memories, decade after decade, that they brought an inner Indian-Summer's warmth?

Yet there are no supra-personal answers I could find - no God, no Deity, despite desire. The need was there - how the need was there, so many times - to believe because of redemption, sorrow, remorse, but such Thought, Curiosity, Reason and Pride as kept me company during the long months of the past year's inner reformation conspired to break such burgeoning faith, such hope, as was required to submit to what always, always in the end seemed, was felt, as some foreign, not-quite-right, culture which might, which could, which did and briefly, draw me away from the living Numen I found, felt, in Nature. Yes - broken, to break, each and every time such things, such phantasmagorical beings, arose as a morning's mist upon some English valley fields.

Thus do I now wait, in almost-ennui: waiting for life to bring such change as may change, as may move me away from the place I call now my home. For there is no desire, no will, to break forth yet again; to change what-is to some perceived, preconceived, pattern, some abstraction, some dream, dreamt and felt. Only a deep wordless inner knowing of such illusion as lived, dwelt, within one so often selfish self; a knowing, such a knowing, to keep me in fleeting moments settled, feeling this life how it is: one vapour which rises to swirl beneath a sky of blue before being given back to the other Life, its source, beyond; one phase among so many phases, so many places, in this our infinite acausal Cosmos.

So there are more flies, midges, here, now; and bees, feeding, as this warming Sun feeds one man's dreams and desires to breed such a momentary happiness as sleeps me. Long gone, it seems, the tears of another anguished sleepless night. So there is yet another living within this strange being stretched out among the dewy ferns and grass.



DWM