shadowlands

“At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door and say,—’Come out unto us.’ But keep thy state; come not into their confusion. The power men possess to annoy me I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my act.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“They themselves do not see the world of light as we do, but our shapes cast shadows in their minds, which only the noon sun destroys.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien

(carolina chickadee / Julie Cook / 2015)

In a maddening life and even more maddening world,
the monochromatic greys and browns have cast a sickly pall and a deepening shadow upon the soul.

Racing five steps forward, while falling 8 steps back, a heavy laden spirit
sinks further into despair.

What of. . .
kindness
thoughtfulness
cooperation
genuineness?

Where is your humanness?
That which marks you as
compassionate
emphatic
concerned
selfless

A worn specter is seen dragging itself through the shadowlands, alone and stooped.
As the world remains in darkness and full of gloom, the figure casts no shadow of its own.
Tears begin falling like overly ripened fruit from a tree, thick and heavy, each landing with a sickening thud.
While weighted feet drag slowly through the muck, one behind the next.

Heavy
Weighted
Slumped
Dragging
Beaten
Dirty
Lonely
Isolated
Dark

In a life and world stripped of any and all light
Greys collide, melding with black and white.
Tonal nothingness wraps itself like a dirty wet heavy towel across the shadowlands.
The ground trembles.

A random clap of thunder suddenly lifts sunken eyes skyward
Three limp figures, atop the hill, reflect the single flash of light.
Within the static electricity, a host of figures emerge.
It is as if a million tiny stars now flicker and dance across the darkened sky.

Light begins reflecting light, as if the sky itself is now on fire.
A thousand crystals shatter into ten thousand shards of perfect light.
Colors crash madly into one another, cascading from the Heavens.
A chromatic sea washes across the dry grey land, monotones scatter.
A spectrum of energy consumes the lifeless.

As light returns, bodies straighten, faces lift.
Light rays playfully now join with shadows, creating an unknown depth and richness
No longer present are the three limp figures atop the single lone hill
Darkness, Death and Despair have been replaced with a dazzling Light. . .
As the single brilliant Light gives way to an endless new Life. . .

The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.
Isaiah 9:2