Enough to live

 I woke up today.

Seems like such a trivial thing.

Yet, depression, this wily companion cannot vociferate in quiet tone what it has brought, to see me wither in anguish. With hoarse wailing it spews out the lament I writhe in. 

... so trivial. Another routine, another migraine, another missed family appointment... the grime of dried tears in my eyes, on my skin, and in my soul pains me; thorns of a life lived in darkness in a box with the floor, walls, and ceilings more prickly than a needle.

Yes, today will be a dark day for me I fear. Another such travesty presented upon my living altar as the offer living leaves upon the steps. At times I wonder if I am an old soul returned to suffer the indignity of living in suffering for no reason other than... to live. I fear the blind muses who aided kings and heroes laugh at my predicament, for no other seems so enduring.

I suppose, once more, I will not kill myself. I will not drive my car inside the garage and leave the engine running with a hose from the muffler to my seat. No, I won't drive my car off a cliff at high speeds. I suppose, I also won't be jumping off any tall bridges either. I've cut my arms so much in my younger-years, so deep in places, all now but marks upon my aging carcass. Yet the scars serve as a living reminder of my failure to die. 

War took so many of my friends, friends who didn't want to die, and left me seemingly untouched... the irony of living is not enduring those moments of loss, but the remembrance of them.

Here I am life. Here I am Nelson. Why? I simply don't know, and frankly at this point... I don't have the strength to care. If I did, would it be reason enough to... live?

Essay: What is the way?

 In a way, I believe nature’s way with which to make way for the way through the ever-changing place we occupy in the current way of things, is but one way. Yes, I'm with you. That's enough of the word way for now. But, is it?

What is the way of things? Imagination would place the way of things in almost 8 billion individualistic viewpoints. Would that be incorrect? Is the way of things the way anyone envisions it? Is the way of things just chaos manifesting perpetually? Is the way of things… real? 

Perhaps the way things are is the way they should be, at least for now. We have seen how change has in both benign and malignant ways changed the world around us. As such, we can surmise that presently things are as they should be based on the premise of good or evil manifesting simultaneously, or in a type of balance. However, balance does not happen just through will alone.  There are a number of actions, reactions, and interactions that must take place.  What are they? Moreover, yin and yang may not be at the center of individualism. It could very well be the nature that exists in all things which drives what we believe is a way for things to be. Culture, language, rearing, social stature, type of government, individualistic codes of the group(s) around us, and more have a direct impact on not just our development, but also on what we form the idea of what the way is on.

In nature, there are plants that tend to grow towards the most natural source of light. In the self-same fashion humans gravitate towards what is necessary to/for them, with some caveats. Whether it is due to external stimuli, conglomerates we are a part of, or other things imparting rules that the individual should follow (not blindly, but by an often-chosen degree of control), it all is the basis for a way to manifest. The presence of others always has a great impact on our decisions and how we react to things. Religion has a particular canon which engages individuals in their respective codes and introduces a set of norms that should be upheld in order to belong. Nature purports to evince rule and direction as a novelty of its own presence. Yet, how does nature make decisions on the flow of the seas, volcanic activity, the movement of the tectonic plates, weather, or other naturally occurring phenomena? Sure, there is an apparent pattern to these things. Does that mean that nature has no control over them? Say that nature, like a human body, has a natural response or queue that is followed as the way for things to be; the way a body responds to a pinch or hot surface, or the ability to breathe without thinking. Perhaps, that is nature’s natural purpose or response to things.

What then will nature decide is proper to conceive in order to control the problem with this one entity we call Homo sapiens and how it has managed to not just overpopulate the surface of the earth we walk upon, but to contribute so harshly to the demise of so many natural things? Yet, I can’t help but wonder about the stated premise of how things are: the way they should be, at least for now. If that’s the case, then the same way a plant would grow towards light, perhaps nature has found a way to control the direction of damage done by Homo sapiens by allowing already available mutations in the genome to manifest. This would explain the shift in what was once known as the natural/right way of sexuality to be. In the end, a preconceived notion does not manipulate what is, it only makes for an interesting afterthought. Our intelligence appears to be relative. 

For all the things we believe we know, humanity’s collective knowledge probably amounts for a fraction of one percent of what is. We have always known much. At a time, we knew incredible amounts about medicine like how to use an x-ray or how to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease, then the avian flu came. Later, intelligent as we were with our intercontinental ballistic missiles, drones, or landing technology in other planets -to name a few-, we encountered COVID-19. Somehow our feeble bodies can now support life through the centenary when there was a time when half-as-much was considered a good life. In the same vein it was once thought that computers would never really take off because of how massive they were. Today nanomedicine is helping us reach target areas in ways never-before possible. If we are a byproduct of millennia of evolutionary processes converging, being discarded, or conforming to stimuli, then it is not a stretch to understand that nature, being parent to us all, would be at least, just as intelligent. There are a number of complex intricacies in the human brain we do not yet understand. It appears to me, nature had no trouble getting it right billions of times over. 

That is not to imply that nature is a member of the types of god-figures which have arisen through time; as far as nature is concerned, we can see it, touch it, smells it, eat it, hear it, sense it, and most importantly are a part of it. Would it be a stretch then to imagine that in order to repair some of the damage that exists in the planet, that nature would impart changes in its already complex ecosystem that would ultimately be self-sustaining? If protecting ourselves is built into our nervous systems, then it is not too far a stretch to believe the same exists in nature. As the Earth wobbles on its axis the frozen poles simply thaw and become frozen elsewhere. We know of animals that migrate or hibernate during different seasons in order to sustain their numbers. I certainly do not understand what the way things should be is, nor can I propose a hypothesis that can be fair to changes in the natural world that I simply cannot comprehend, or am not meant to. Rationally, it would be wise to ponder on the possibilities we are to encounter in our brief stay in nature, while narrowly depending on what will help with the continuity of the self and promoting an environment of prosperity.

We cannot do it all, we are bound by the limits of our imagination, gadgets, and intelligence. Can nature do it all, given the perpetuity of its nature? We found carbon dating (some decades ago) to be an incredible tool to understand the age of things. This was something that nature had been doing all along, it was already coded, materialized, and happening abound. Examples of the perplexing nature with which things occur in nature continue to amaze. For all this, I find myself pondering, what is the way?

Dear Christ

 I’m not religious anymore.

But I am here now, open the door.

I know that You’re not real, I don’t care.

This pain I drag I cannot bear.

Sure, You’re not there, You don’t exist; 

a figment of my broken heart on my bloody wrist,

a friend where there’s no one, hoped for;

the bearer of my pain and sorrow in life’s war.

In this dark hour please hear my plea,

here so alone, wouldn’t You agree?

In physical and mental pain,

turn off all the thoughts here in my brain.

There is a rock weighing down my chest,

can hardly breathe, I’m trying my best,

but this veil of sorrow against me pressed

drags me about, my conviction it test

and I fail every time; this I detest,

for in this state I dare not jest.

Of my life and well-being I my own pest, 

failing miserably at my own behest.

The worse of it I have suppressed, 

yet alone once more I am depressed.

Desire there is plenty, to overcome!

Yet, here we sit, always the outcome.

To see it all happen again, 

to count the numbers one through ten…

No amount of dedication can overwhelm,

the shadow of doubt under this elm,

its leaves hiding my body on the floor

where it has fallen so many times before.

No gardener to come and blow away these leaves

as I, over myself, seeing how he bereaves

a testament of half truths and lies

under subtle, yet screaming cries.

Hold me now, as my life I pry,

take me please as You pass by,

help me finally say goodbye,

transition to the endless sky.

Take me now, the moment nigh

just this once, be my ally

I just need to leave; elsewhere cry,

if You exist, just help me die.

My heavy heart cannot condone

that I have reaped what I have sown.

Though fair it may be, who cares now

this last wish You must allow.

Come now Almighty, or are You shy?

Don’t You dare just stand by,

as I plea with tooth and nail,

and in this final moment You I hail.

How awful to yet again to call on You,

after all that we’ve been through…

You abandoned me, You wretched vile

even here on my last trial.

At least hold me close, just once appear

before the lights are no longer clear.

Though I tried not to, I hurt my dear,

and thus, human at last I am here.

In the decadent solace of this year

as I fail once more to persevere,

in a life where everything was so severe,

the moment’s close now, the next I peer…

How easy must it be to use others,

scapegoats all the same, even mothers.

To say You died for the sins of all,

taking no responsibility after all. 

Just portend, say others were to blame,

to You is probably all the same, 

which explains why I am here alone,

at death’s door chilled to the bone.

The pain slowly receding, finally almost there!

No longer, for me, have others care;

I this weight of problems and ails,

finally leaving on death’s sails.

Dry now my weary throat,

no more crying as I float, 

to some afterlife on a dreary boat

to life’s poison, no antidote.

Just one final destination to note,

with nothing left, no pant, no coat,

never again to be a scapegoat,

of life, this final moment, my footnote.

Yet, in this solace where are You?

Omniscient after all, You probably knew,

This outcome would always be,

and you let it happen; disagree?

Have one last philosophical quandary with me!

Where is your shadow if you’re a tree,

the shade to protect from life’s travail,

even in the end, trying to no avail.

Are you not there, yet again?

The quiet is hoarse even when,

the life you gave me, here I heist

your sacrifice, now mine, dear Christ.