Might life be fuller, better, even great, if I looked different
Like a bruised fruit only part of me is good to eat
Spoiled parts of me to be transformed
Into sweet jams with which to fill summer fair pies
Compost from which I can grow whole again
I can’t tattoo myself whole
I can’t work myself whole
I can’t smoke myself whole
There is a hole in my wholeness
If I embrace it, love it, dance with it
The nebulas of uncertainty and self-disdain can rest easy
I fill the hole instead of sitting in its safe container
Of perfect floral air
a moss cushion my bed
Pop culture distractions fence me from my essence.
Will I ever embrace my imperfections
or forever a rotten plum
I don’t know why but there is something in Milosz’s poem that made me think of yours. Perhaps I see a resonance between: ‘I was afraid of what was wild and indecent in me’ and ‘will I ever embrace my imperfections.’
ReplyDeleteThe thing is that the essence of life is undomesticated and it better remain so. By wanting to control too much, understand too much, manipulate it too much according to our will and plans we end up missing it’s essence which has more to do with something river-like perpetually running downstream than a thing we can place in a container; something we can hold and handle, something we can measure, evaluate and nicely fit into pre-established categories, labels, concepts and ideas, none of them ever really ours.
Our essence, as with the essence of life itself is un-named for it is unnamable, it is the measure of all things but cannot itself be measured. It is the Tao, the source of all things, the watercourse way where all things find their origins, whence they come whither they return. It’s the infinity of time and space of which we are an integral part. We cannot contain that which bears, supports and contains us. That’s where the holes come in and in a way I would argue the more of them we have the better for it is only through these pores, ruptures, breaches, crevasses, splinters, cracks that make us feel uncomfortable with our lives and with whom we are that we can dare an opening into the whole of which our individual wholeness is but an expression.
So yes, what else other than what you suggest; embrace these holes, dance with them, be playful with them in whatever life situation they present themselves, laugh with them when it is time to laugh and cry with them when it is time to cry. It is through the acceptance of these holes, these imperfections that we open to who we really are in our depths instead of running in ever growing sense of confusion and bewilderment form one fabricated image of us to another, never finding peace, never finding quiet, and never finding ourselves adequate, never able to rest on our ground and to own who we truly are.
So yes, the holes are blessings in that they help us uncover layer after layer of a conditioned self-image to which we over identify. It is through these holes that we can apprehend our emptiness which is at the same time the perfect expression of our wholeness. By emptiness I mean that things have an intrinsic quality of openness, spaciousness and aliveness to them, they cannot be filled and topped for they are constantly flowing. We cannot stop this movement which in essence is change and transience. But if we embrace our imperfections we can then allow ourselves to be with all things as they are, simply as they are and that brings brings us to suchness, to thahata…. The core of Buddha’s teachings; simply being with things as they are without creating ideas about them, ultimately letting go of all idea of self and other……simply realizing there is nothing to hold on to, nothing to secure, nothing to possess.
The following may illustrate this point. An aged Brahman once visited the Buddha carrying gifts in both hands. Seeing the Brahman the Master said, “Drop it”. The Brahman let fall one of his gifts to the ground. Again the Master said, “Drop it”. The Brahman dropped the other gift. Then the Master again said “Drop it”. The Brahman was at a loss for a moment, and then smiled, for he had attained enlightenment.