There are moments in life, when you must drop everything you’re doing, find the nearest place to sit, and breathe. It takes some steadying, to recover from the unexpected silence that miracles birth. Calling it epiphany would be a disservice. Let us say that when the universe is in an uninvited guest in the quiet drawing room of your soul, it is best to sit quietly and listen.
So this morning, that is what I did.
On my cursory scroll through timelines and feeds, I met this poem today. It’s uncanny, that, when you’re writing about a particular thing, you encounter it everywhere. Just yesterday, I was reversing the unfortunate, somewhat reductive maxim - ‘when the student is ready, the teacher appears’.
Well, a teacher did appear. Not in the way I imagined, though. Merwin was quietly waiting his turn, perhaps, a bit miffed that I had gone so long without consulting him. I picked up his words.
Honestly, to read Merwin’s poetry, is to gingerly walk through a quiet, unexplored path in a forest. From all sides, curious eyes emerging, scanning your tentative steps. Every shrub in the understory coruscates with sunlight stolen from eternities of waiting.
That Merwin saw isn’t the matter of debate here. What is especially of interest to me, is that each poem is an exercise in humility; each turn of phrase, a surprise, cloaked in the mundane attire of sight. His forest is alive with the tacit insight of patience. Isn’t this the best, the only kind of education there is? And what fire is there in that student’s eyes who realises that they have learnt, without discerning how, or when, the magic happened.
Indeed, when you have reached the end of the path of a Merwin poem, you suddenly realise that you have reached the other side of the forest. You raise your head, sniff the air, look around, and realise that it is just a wee bit cooler here. Even the landscape is different. There is a pair of butterflies circling a lantana bush, only interested in each other.
You look at them and smile.
You can read my favourite W.S. Merwin poem ‘Separation, here.
To be continued…
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