The painful steps of anguish
He took to the forest at night;
No tunic did he take.
He sought to solve the chaos within and without.
His wife turned over and found
She could hear him on the ground.
She went there to find,
What could be troubling him?
Disturbing his heart and mind,
Wars of terror compelled him for answers to seek.
Night and day he saw
Anxiety among all people did grow.
What is God doing about this?
He asked all he met.
The farmer told him how,
We should all work and bow
Under the might forces,
That directed all humanity’s actions.
These questions of God and humanity he sought his thought;
Solutions in solitude, he wrestled and fought.
Within extravagant halls of Kings and Queens,
He knew that privilege was flaunted
To reach sublime heights of indifference;
Its stench on life it leaves.
He heard the sage cry aloud,
Wondering if the vast crowd
Was seeking to know –
What he had seen and understood.
People’s shocking inhumanity and greed.
Calm reflection and meditation was a need.
Our experiences are whirligigs in time.
Are these as bewildering,
Or lessons from life bestowed?
The priest and the scholar depict,
Each of our lives a vast crypt.
Having no chance for escape,
Except they teach us our shape.
Brutal conflicts in humanity’s history seen cast,
As I, in anguish pondered upon our past.
While pondering this in meditation,
I understood why no one was able
To show how to extract this destructive quest;
To let us dwell in peace with others.
My neighbor said he wanted more,
And didn’t mind if it meant gore,
Or anything debase and vile,
So long as he did win.
Solutions wrenched my heart and mind
Exiting this intense desire was most kind.
The indifferent thinks not of life as sacredness.
For what they inflict upon others;
Surely, in some lifetime returns.
Replacing any gain past with torment.
But all these warnings go unheard
When people travel in a herd;
And eat, breathe, sleep, and die,
And never wonder – Why?
Cult-like unreflective behavior grabs us take a time,
For transformation of our heart and mind.
The source of ignorance revealed in the Light,
Disappearing not from my sight.
That Sound from beyond, I listened.
I heard from the ALL, we came all.
Theories and solutions were incomplete,
History only viewed from outside.
Short sighted answers from outside my friend –
But the darkness in us must end.
All this gifted from self-peace came
My soul to me bequeaths.
This fruitful task, this I do.
Refocus and reflect on the inner you.
When outside seems lost and bleak,
And humanity’s insanity uses doublespeak.
Into the fray I then return.
My universal experiences bestowed,
This desperate world to teach and show.
That, Humanity, are we all not one?
©,Ralph A Calabria