This David Whyte poem appears in Marion Woodman’s book Dancing in the Flames and really speaks to me, I love her interpretation of it which at the most profound level speaks of the inner healing soul work so many of us are called to do as a result of trauma, so I wanted to share it here.
No one told me
it would lead to this.
No one said
there would be secrets
I would not want to know.
No one told me about seeing
Seeing brought me loss and a darkness
I could not hold.
No one told me about writing
and speaking.
Speaking and writing poetry
I unsheathed the sharp edge
of experience that led me here.
No one told me
it could not be put away.
I was told once, only,
in a whisper.
“The blade is so sharp –
It cuts things together,
and not apart.”
There is no comfort.
My future is full of blood
from being blindfolded,
hands outstretched,
feeling a way, along its firm edge.
The feminine leads us to the sharp edge of experience. There we have to feel our feelings in our bodies; there our secrets become visible in the darkened, unvisited corners of our psyches. Claiming the unswept corners of our psyches leads us to compassion for ourselves and for others. Knowing we have done our best and it simply wasn’t enough opens our hearts to other human beings whose best has likewise failed. The mind has its logic; the heart alone can know wisdom, bridge chasms, make peace.
Its is only by recognising and healing the dualities that exist in ourselves that we can come to a true sense of interdependence with the rest of creation. We are just beginning to have some understanding of the interdependence of natural systems. If we pollute the earth, we are polluting ourselves; if we destroy the rain forests, the loss of oxygen affects every living thing.
(in contrast) in a linear concept of progression, death is seen as something that can only be denied or projected. (But what is denied still exists even if we deny it : manipulation of material things and nature, only gives the impression of progress, denial of chaos also leads to a denial of the power of natural regenerative processes to birth new life forms out of old and this includes our psyche which naturally operate through organic, at times chaotic processes.)
Emerging From The Dark Night 