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Some sketches of people living their lives late at night and under the self-inflicted weary eye of some indefinable inner alienation. Hollow people in a hollow world. I wrote this a few years ago a little while after a friend had died. An intelligent person, driven by their own demons or distraction to drown themselves slowly in wine. I was an observer of late night life in the town where I live. There was a lot of loneliness and emotional desolation out there, like some vacuum or void of confusion and emptiness. People seemed deeply lonely.
Click on the shiny green street scene for one Aussie approach that is being used to help with these things...
The Compass of Time
rain falls - a looking glass boulevard
of emeralds and ash
reflections orphaned in the night
by crystal sheets of soft duration
argent pain of the lotus children
alchemy dreams like snow
in silent contemplation
of an ancient emptiness
broken friends all aspire
to a lonely lingering unity
shattered planes and shards all dark
drench your youth with time
RSS 
Its funny how sometimes the more people there are in one place, the more lonely and alienated they seam.
I could never live in Canberra :) Try Newtown, Marrickville, or Auburn in Sydney for some suburbs with a slight sense of community (or come to Venezuela) :)
Tamara
Yes, I have been loneliest in a crowd and, at times, most comfortable alone.
I have heard Newtown (for those who won’t know - it is a suburb of inner city Syndey) is like a small town - self-encapsulated so that you don’t have to leave for anything you might need.
An e-friend once relayed a little Osho Zen to me:
”Loneliness is when you are lonely, when you are thinking of the other, missing the other, it is a negative state. Aloneness is the presence of oneself, it is very positive, you can fill the universe with your presence and there is no need for anybody”
p.s. Venezuela sounds lovely. Just me, a small little hut in the hills, some picturesque mountain scenery, some goats and staple crops in the field, oh - and some thirty-seven billion mosquitoes. If I was a rich man, ba da dee da dee da dee da dee da dee da dee da dum, I would visit many places - South America would be one of them. :)
The lone traveler, eclipsed
in the dust at the wayside
of the mind’s parched earth
Were it not for words
spoken in urgent hush,
the gaping chasm, gone
with a hand outstretched.
GPC072108
I’ll see your compound alienation, your desire and search for love, meaning and connection in life through language and communication, and raise you a lost walk in the woods by the light of a flickering candle in the darkness...
but we both already know the darkness and our words, once employed to light the way, our words now scatter and clutter at our feet - slowing us like quicksand or mud...
The Forests of Night
Windswept winter streets where alone
we strode
silent stoned sleeping
under streetlights and stars (like stairs).
Sweet treason of our dreams
these troubled tripping streams
and futile prophets
to true exile and dust.
If these times and trials have triumphed
over what mortal remains to witness,
then - like vapour trails
we scent the future
in the mannered strength (and dissolution)
of our passing.
G.
:o ;) :)
)
File Type: Image
Dichotomy or not?
Forever unexplained.
We cease to live when we have come up with the answer.
All cities have these rich lonely souls who decide to look away rather than look deeper into reality, for many the reality really sucks.
But many a poets, novelists and artists are born from these emotionally churned rich creative mind. In abberation lies their beauty and identity. But many sink deeper into depression and are lost.
It is good to have initiatives like Beyondblues to help lost souls but sometimes mind emerges from these churnings and struggle on its own.
Beyond Blue should help a lot of people. People need to acknowledge their sadness, to realise there is nothing wrong or unnatural with feeling that way, before they can attempt to dissolve or resolve it. In contradistinction to Grace’s post on happiness, this one is perhaps a reflection on melancholy.
It seems to me that the depths of being ”peripheral” and ”emotionally churned” are the place to be to see the world as it really is. It’s just a little hard to swim back to the surface after diving so deep, at times.
;)