Where Does My Heart Go From Here? I sit, uncertain and afraid beside the silent sea of my life. Afraid and despairing, weak and unsure. The cloying darkness lit only by the small torch that I hold so desperately in my hand. It's light is weak, illuminating just myself and a small circle of the sands of time and place that I inhabit now. For the fiftieth, one-hundredth, one-thousandth time I look up, peering across the dark, placid sea toward the unseen islands beyond, hoping to see one such as me...a light such as mine. But the darkness reigns, there is nothing to see, and I am alone. I sit remembering, trying to forget, never to forget, how I came to this place of darkness and despair. I had been here before of course...many times, as everyone must stop on their way between the days of light. But I remember it never being like this, never like this!! Always there were lights in the distance, lights nearby on nearby islands, the feeling of "this is a temporary thing, a mandatory port of call on a long voyage". I don't feel that way now. And I am afraid. Remembering the first time I saw your flame on the horizon of my life. So bright, so pure, the fire burning just for me, it seemed, the other torchbearers not noticing, or ignoring the brilliance of your light. I set to work, holding my own torch high, beginning to build a bridge to yours, noting with a great joy that you were doing the same. Closer and closer we grew our bridges, spanning the dark sea with only our lights to guide us. Til finally we were joined, embracing each other with open hearts, our light filling the sky for all to see, to envy, to rejoice in as we too rejoiced. We spent our lives on the bridge, meeting in the center, surrounded by the light. We built a bonfire there, from the flint of our passion, the tinder of our love. I would sit by the fire, warmed by it's heat, bathed in it's glow, waiting for the first moment that your torch would appear on the horizon, the fire's flames leaping in response. And I was happy. So very happy. As were you. I know you were happy. Your light was so very bright. I was so captured by the fire, by the light, that it was all I could see, all I wanted to see. So I ignored all my other bridges, letting them fall into disuse, disrepair. But I didn't care, because I was so happy. So very happy. But you weren't so happy now. I know you weren't. Your light started to dim. I don't know when it started for sure, but I found myself waiting longer and longer beside the fire for your return. It became harder for me to make you out on that dark distant horizon. Maybe it was when we began to argue about the way our bridge was built, or maybe when we fought about how you always found me waiting there. Maybe you got scared when I told you how much I needed your light, and how desperately I awaited it's return every night. Maybe it was because you found my light so pale and dull beside your own blazing pyrotechnics, the thing I envied about you more than anything. I tried to change it, I really did...mixing more and more ingredients into my flame, to make them leap and dazzle as yours did. But you frowned at my attempts, and eventually you laughed at them, so I let my light dim, grow cold for a time, in anger and despair. There came a time on our bridge when you did not appear, when I strained my eyes in vain to make you out in the distance, to see your light in the darkness. Finally, when you arrived, my heart and torch leaping. But as time passed, my waiting grew longer and longer. I tried to help, moving our bonfire out of the middle, farther and farther along your portion of the bridge, but you seemed not to notice at all. I awaited each arrival now, no longer sitting by the fire, but standing, counting the clock that tells the time, my first sight of you now more one of relief than the consuming joy I used to feel. Such was my need to be with you, to be near you, our light and flames mingling, that I forsook all other of my bridges, letting them all eventually sink into the sea, working so hard to keep ours strong and bright. But I failed. You let me fail. What help you gave to save our bridge, our bonfire, was thin and weak and thoughtless and cruel and.....useless. There came the night when you did not arrive at all, though I waited by our fire, tending it as best I could by myself. I waited and waited, unable to wait, walking down your part of the bridge, searching, calling your name. I remember finally giving up, returning to the embers of our fire, seeing your note there, charred and burning, only the final word still legible....."Goodbye". I never saw your reasons, if you had any. I never saw your despair, if there was any. I never saw your "I'm sorry", if that was even said. I sat there for the longest time, blowing on the coals, trying to ignite them by myself. But I could not, the fuel I had to give not enough to keep our fire alive. So I sat there as it slowly, finally went out. Sat there as I watched your part of our bridge collapse into the dark sea. I stumbled back to shore then, hearing my own part of the bridge crashing into the water behind me as I walked, wanting it to carry me down too, into the icy depths. But it did not, and I reached the shore, turning around, looking and searching, surrounded by the darkness, no light to be seen anywhere, the flickering of my own torch barely enough to see the sand upon which I stood. For uncounted time I stood there, peering at the place our beautiful bridge had stood. I waited, desperate and alone, hoping like the Phoenix to see it rise again, as if by some miracle. But it did not, as I knew that it wouldn't, as I knew that it couldn't, and in anger and despair I let the flames of my own torch grow dim, weak, finally to go out. I stood there in the total darkness, wondering if I had died. Finally, afraid, I knelt down and began to pray. "Oh God, help me! I don't know what to do. I am so scared of the dark....I can not live without the light!" For an eternity I knelt there in the sand, unable to see, unable to hear, barely able to breathe, until finally I saw before me a small red glow. I crawled towards it, carrying my extinguished torch in my hand, hoping against hope. No burning bush this, but an ember aglow nonetheless. I thrust my torch against it, breathing my life against it, watching it grow. It did not grow much, barely the smallest of flames. But enough somehow to ignite my torch, to make it burn again, no matter how weakly. I sat there afraid, nursing the flame, trying to find the fuel to make it burn, finally succeeding, the total darkness around me gone, if only for the moment. Eventually I stood, walking down the beach of my island, holding my tiny torch aloft, staring out into the distance, searching for a response, any response, my eyes straining into the night. I walked and walked, stared and strained, my shoulder aching, the torch held so plaintively high, but unable, in the end, to see any light but the dim one of my own, finally giving up, the darkness almost swallowing me. So here I sit, uncertain and afraid beside the silent sea of my life. Alive at least, but barely so, my torch no better than a single candle now. Struggling within myself to go on, to continue the search, but wondering if I truly can. Knowing that time heals all wounds, that love will endure, that it is always darkest before the dawn. Knowing all these things are more than just cliches. But also knowing that I am alone and afraid, the biggest question unanswered, unanswerable.... Please, I need to know. Where does my heart go from here?? Please tell me... Ohh, please....
Copyright © 2000 Joan Bentley |