Multitudes

Inspired by Walt Whitman, a piece on the general complexity of life.

I fascinate myself
There I said it
Gone all the way from a cowering swallow
To an arcing eagle
One eye on heaven
One trained on earth with disdain
There goes a creature rejoicing and lamenting
All in one glance
They say

Whitman after all contradicted himself
Running his flowery fingers through all that grass
So why can't I be fascinated?
I too shall contain multitudes

My mind carries more lives than a thousand mothers
This one sings to a little man inside a flower
This one writes in blood on the walls of a prison
This one is tired of thinking at all

I find myself in the position of a wise man
Sitting astride a tomb
Transcribing the whispers of the multitude
As they slip from one life to the next
And there is, I'm convinced, a next.

So I etch out the contours of my mind
Make a mark of my own here and there but mostly
I just listen
And perhaps in a few centuries
I will learn not to be afraid
Of the Being who wove such a mind


August 23, 2019