Navel Gazing

To live well for me would be to wander in a garden. An earthly one.

I wonder at the bitter roots of my mind’s fruits—why am I so faithless?

I have learned by turning on myself, yet all the while my soul abides.

I shed myself and find new skin, moving from vesicle to vesicle.

Long is the day and short the night,

but darkness shrouds my inner light.

 

When the sun rises, my cat rushes to the light.

It warms her, she bathes in it. I admire her

ability to enjoy these daily pleasures.

We are not so far apart. I can see

her intentions but I cannot reach

that inner peace in her eyes.

 

Beauty lies all around us, I suppose it’s in the eyes.

Too often, I sat waiting for another to kindle this light.

How deep seem my shallows, how shallow my deep;

for that which the eye cannot touch lingers beyond reach

taunting the proud. I approach my shadow.

Who approaches? I AM, speaks my soul.

 

Let us not linger too long in the depths. Brevity is the soul

of wit. Sometimes, I am troubled by long nights. My eyes

burn as I squint in the dark. I should be sleeping

but a question is stuck in my throat, longing

to be announced. Am I that, which I am?

As soon as I posit myself entire, I enter a labyrinth.

 

This wandering life can grow weary. Where is the center of the labyrinth?

One tires of the spirit’s walls. I long for an audience with my soul.

Invocation is less than worthless. I seek, it recedes.

My mind knows not what it asks.

I seek Ithaca—I am at sea—

must I make of these breakers my home?

 

I see some distant mass and long to find my home.

I think I am found; I move through a labyrinth

of familiar shapes, yet they seem empty.

Perhaps, I am wrong. Maybe home is in the apse of the eye.

My wondering is self-reflexive (I am at odds with myself).

Once again, I ask: where is the heart of the labyrinth?

 

Night is forever; silence waits at the end of delight. Doubt is a labyrinth;

innocence loses its way. The spirit rooms in the soul, passing another day.

My heart is like meaning, it works thanklessly for me day and night.