Sweet Darkness
When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.
When your vision has gone
no part of the world can find you.
Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.
There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.
The dark will be your womb
tonight.
The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.
You must learn one thing:
the world was made to be free in.
Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.
Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn
anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.
by David Whyte from House of Belonging
A note from Rulik
Sweet Darkness by David White is a good prescription for a certain kind of depression. The kind that comes from ongoing attacks on the self. Initially, these might have come from a judgmental parent. Later, that judgment was internalized, turning into a self-made prison where nothing can be rewarding or valued because “I am of no value.” When such thoughts become part of one’s identity, they are hard to change.
The poem points one back to the very source: What brings you alive? Can you first consider and later learn that distinction? Then, have the courage to let go of all the other things that are Too Small for YOU.
