Journey to Ixtlan

The poem “Like a Shadow” is about the tendency of the past to linger even while a person realizes truths about themselves and the world.


Like a Shadow

What came before may persevere
exacting cost against the change
now unwilling to release
those who seek to find their way
the paths may open late in life
disregarding history
even while the tales repeat
echoes none would choose to hear

the deeper truths may take time
informed by signposts in the fog
becoming clearer as the sun
burns the doubt from the mind
pointing onward into light
still the darkness is nearby
with the tendrils reaching forth
like a shadow that persists

only existing as a shade
reliant on brightness to exist
to have one will bring the other
but death awaits in retreat
to shun this creature is to turn
back to the pit from where it came
instead persevere with the change
knowing life will then persist.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20181006.

I’m a pretty liberal guy. I’m also a Southerner, born in Louisiana and raised most of my life in Alabama. I firmly believe that removal of the Confederate flag from the grounds of the State house. I do not support the call to remove Confederate monuments. This action would both dishonor the intentions of those who memorialized the fallen and give society an opportunity to forget the past. In the future these monuments will not be a celebration of a past. They will instead be a reminder of where we came from, and a warning not to turn back that way.


Monuments
Poem for Day 180 – 20150629

A way of life fought for years ago,
power elite struggled for status quo.
Politicians sought to hold the line,
contest ended on the losing side.

Thousands died in battles lost,
loved ones remembered afterwards.
Monuments built to stamp in stone
the blood of those then gone.

Headstones erected to the dead,
honoring solder and veteran,
echoes placed by those who loved
the ones departed to the loam.

The wheel of years has turned around,
with groups of hatred in control
of heritage's objects once held dear,
long separated from a first intent.

Where is the place to honor the dead,
to place significance on past history?
Where does the remembrance of loss end,
the beginning of hate's queer taint begin?

Do we tear down the monuments,
erected by the women of the men?
Do we smash cold headstones
to move into the here and now?

Society is built on past's dismal swamp,
the mire is drained to heal the all.
What place will the fallen hold
when monuments have been destroyed?

© 2015, Sean Green. All Rights Reserved.

A friend wrote “Why do people give death such a negative connotation? ”. I answered “Death is change, and change is bad.” Another person answered “I think it's (death) a fundamentally alien state. Everything we experience (life) is predicated on our ability to be experiencing it. In death, that stops happening. We can't really think about what it would be like to not exist, because the ability to process the thought of not existing depends, by necessity, on existing.”.

The comment that death represented non-existence kicked off a thought for me. While death as change is a valid insight, the latter reason given, that death is non-existence, is the BIG FEAR. This fear of death is unfounded. Fear is removed when the duality of life and death is realized. The following is an excerpt from “The Alchemy of Opposites” by Rodolfo Scarfalloto:

“Birth is a beginning, death is a completion, and visa versa. To allow a thing to be complete is to make room for something new. Fear of birth is fear of the new and unknown. Fear of death is the same thing. To regard one as better is to be ruled by the other. To reject the cycle of birth and death altogether, to be blind to its beauty, is to close the door that which is beyond birth and death. To simultaneously experience the majesty of both is to move beyond both, and therefore, beyond time. “

This excellent analysis explores the duality of birth (life), death, and their connecting element, fear. The fear of death recedes at the same time the fear of life is removed. The interplay of the two polarities, life and death, transcends both.

What does this mean? The bottom line is that people who fear death also have a fear of life. To fully live is to experience many deaths. These deaths come in the various small forms. They are completions that open the cycle to new beginnings. Most people ignore the treasure of these and instead focus on the final big death – Death. and then the final big one. The big one, the apparent termination of being, is itself a transition.

The ultimate illusion of death is the apparent singularity of death transitions. This singularity presents death as a one-way, one-time event. The shamanist knows there is more, embracing the fullness of death for themselves and their charges. Death becomes an entity that is both known and respected, the same as any force in the shamanist's world. The singularity of death is recognized, serviced, and surpassed as both a tool and gateway.

More info about the Shamanist and Death can be found in one of my blog entries from 2007.

Near death experiences are great for sharing the wisdom of the moment.  I had one of those this week.  In this case death was change and the near part was real.  I avoided big change, and in the process I saw better my immediate life.  I suppose I have to thank the guidance that's embraced me.  Tis a cool thing!

The only constant is change... or that is the way things should be. We old(er) people get stuck in wanting things to remain the same, and it is up to the youth to drag us forward. I was inspired to think this by seeing a quote attributed to Grace Hopper's commencement speech to the Trinity College class of 1987, which was excerpted in TIME.

What are us old(er) people to do in the face of this challenge?   Easy... think young, act young, and cultivate change. The latter will help ensure the two formers!