Fable of the Human Who Sometimes Regresses

author's note:

He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.
                    -- Dr. Johnson


FABLE OF THE HUMAN WHO SOMETIMES REGRESSES

When I lived
as a wild hirsute beast
I moved toward pleasure
and moved away from pain

until the night I could not move
after an injury from a falling stone.

As I felt the life within began to ebb
I suddenly desired to see the world
I’d ignored--the world I was losing

and found, to my surprise
a living mystery
of moonlight and shadow
captured by this jungle
in its cage
of barbs and tangles.

But I awoke the next morning, alive--
yes, alive and beginning to heal--
given strength by the desire
to again witness beauty--
to experience
the grand inexpressible feelings
such witnessing brings.

But inexpressible feelings
demand expression
and so, in desperation
I discovered the faulty machine
known as “language”--

a tool some believe makes us human.

Maybe so, but maybe
we begin the process
when we first witness beauty.
In any case, I sometimes regress:
some animal in me still wants
to move away from the pain
of being human
and seek only numbing pleasure.

But oh--
so many stones
and even boulders
fall into my life (as with any life)--
sometimes, I can not escape
the pain of injury--

pain that may remind me
of the pain of that night.

But if it does, I then remember
how to soothe the wound
by opening to
this beautiful mystery.

33 1/3 New Fables & Myth: ebook
© 2021, Michael R. Patton