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A good friend of mine who has fallen on hard times wrote a very moving blog post the other day about her situation. Not sure exactly how to articulate the things I wanted to say in the comments section I instead posted a poem that by far expressed things better than I ever could.
It’s called ‘Love After Love’ by Derek Walcott and talks about something that I think people from all walks of life struggle with, trying to peel their own image from the mirror:
Love After Love
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
Ever since the day I posted this poem it’s stayed on my mind quite a bit and I think that’s because the story has such a deep resonance in my own life right now.
I’m not sure what I’d do if faced with the situation layed out in ‘Love After Love’. Even after three decades worth of walking around on this earth I still struggle each day with trying to live life as who I am instead of other more faded versions. The quiet one hammered out by my childhood, or the version that’s been filtered through society’s preferences, the one that slips out of conversations about families, just a few among many ill-fitting suits.
I think sitting down with your true self would be hard, not least because…well what if it turns out that person has no place in the life you’re living now? Peeling your own image from the mirror can (and should) be done but no doubt it involves much risk, vulnerablity, and a certain kind of courage only alluded to in poems.
But then again facing those things can’t be nearly as bad as going through life as someone else, right?
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Anita,
This Post of yours has a deep meaning and much importance to me, until this day, Iam not 100% agree with what they say about hapinness being a mind matter, and whats better to refute that but with one of your sentences in this post: “the version that’s been filtered through society’s preferences” it´s a tough matter to let ourselves letting go across he sea of society’s preferences. So Far, in my sessions everytime that Iam asked if Iam happy I say no, If I do believe in Happiness I say yes, but then why I am not. Because part of me says that is a Fallacy perhaps?
The thing to be solved in a examination in the mirror by reflecting what you really are, being honest to ourselves is the first thing we should accomplish ( I accomplished already I think) now Its more like being walking on the ground among your equals but coming from the Moon to me. The eternal struggle consume what you place is, what your mission is, If you fit in this that we called society, life, earth, whatever. If you fit in what you are doing right now,…. in my case it´s hard to say and hardest to see. Iam feeling like walking through battles with a canon of excuses to keep walking, just because it´s early to leave yet.
How come somone knows what he/she is but can not let the self be out and free.
If that was true, I rathed go back to the Moon, because this place where I stand it´s such a mess.
I miss what I never had, who I never met, where I never was. How come is that possible if you at leats haven´t experienced some part of these things, then we might have an unknown conscience that actually did experience these things.
Sometimes by losing one only thing in your life, the most important thing in your life, your lose yourself. It´s hard to be over that.
But the perfect moment to say and right words comes from a poem like the one you posted. I remember the poems I loved never could read again.
Perhaps, It would be a reason to start writing poems again. :)
Thank you Anita!
This what you wrote is so special.
Hi Nairim,
Thank you for your comment and I’m glad you liked this blog post. I think writing poetry again is an awesome idea, it will give a voice to (or maybe even set free) some of the things you are experiencing right now.
I don’t think any person on earth could go through the loss of such a pillar in their life without feeling a deep sense of mourning. It may not be necessary to ‘get over’ that, instead maybe it would be good to build something new and more positive from the rubble? Not sure if any of this is making sense but it sounds good in my mind ;).