Sciamachy

The ghost has no shape, yet I can feel its presence. It does not always say anything audible, but I hear its voice relentlessly. Heavy exhaustion from my fight with an imaginary adversary swallows up all energies. Yet, there are no tangible results from any investigation to discover who this opponent is! I often outrun my shadow and find refuge in the light, but how do I draw away from myself? Do others have phantoms like mine? If they do, shouldn’t we learn to cohabit with our ghouls like we learn languages to express our emotions? We may prefer and become skilled at hiding the demons, but for how long? Isn’t an entire lifetime for the charade to continue too long? Who, if anybody, is even listening to or paying attention to my despair? No one!

Being alive is a wordless, silent, and fatal diagnosis. Everyone is in “therapy” every moment with a rational mind. Along with prayers for the extraordinary, perhaps it awaits at the end of the struggle. However, the deceptive and evading “end” has always been challenging to pinpoint. Every breath, gaze, step, or smile could interchangeably be anyone’s last or the next. A cascade of misunderstandings from this perplexity makes life heavier. Inner tranquility evaporates from the false whirling of urgency to oscillate between comparisons of things getting better or worse. Focus on the important; the immediate becomes distorted. While every exhale brings the last one ever so close, almost suddenly, in a blink, the barb and the battle rage without a victory for either side. For eons, on behalf of the commoners, the Saints, Rishis, Preachers, Hermits, etc., have been combing through the scrolls to unearth the reason for the conflict and the enemy’s identity.