Monday, August 07, 2006
Ode to an Enemy
Dear friend, enemy,
doubly am I beholden to you:
for it was your ceaseless attack that drove me
to the depths of my being
to find my true self -
responsible inviolable, precious.
But more than that,
it is through trying to find
your most compassionate and protective core
within the mist of your supposed enmity
that I am plunged
grieving, sobbing, breathless,
into intimate love for you
from which I emerge
unvanquishable,
having drunk of the elixir of life.
How then can I but be utterly at your mercy ?
I shall suffer in silence -
not your slings and slander,
which were merely phantasms
of my own creation;
nor for missing your friendship,
for I have been and am one with you;
but this futile loss of precious life
flung cheaply into the bog of sloth
to be compacted and thrown into the flames of purification.
There shall you be, friend, friendless
while I, your enemy, grieve your absence -
for only in the fullness of all
lies my own.
Image: Love Thy Enemy, by Bogdan Migulski.
