THE PROBLEM OF THE DARK
Rebecca Lilly
I trust life to finish the job somehow, sparing me histories in the netherworld (which I once thought would lift me out, but only confirmed my appointment with the devil). I’m always on the lookout for omens, lessons I can’t ignore, and dark coincidences. If deception’s the norm, it’s a guess if I’ve booked that appointment. While I’d rather not venture into netherworlds, I can’t simply disregard the problem of dark. Come hell or high water, I’m slated to write up this report for my memoirs (a foreword with cavernous tunnels, and sweatshops with chains and machetes, before the real horror starts!). I’ve a penchant to personify too much, but the devil’s not a person, and superstition is the enemy of attention no less than my ongoing dream of eating snowflakes off the street, desperately, to keep from overheating! If enough snowflakes go down my throat, my mouth mumbles out the cold eventually, the devil’s like the Wizard of Oz, just a hoax. If only what mindfulness teachers call the clear light mind took almost no effort! Unfortunately, a lie is insidious. The soul isn’t complicated, say the mystics. It’s just so close we never see it.