The Chasm

With my face lodged against the window pane,

As the rain putter-patters on the glass,

I wait for sight of his sweat sodden shirt,

Ready to greet him weary from work.

I'll run to him, and he'll catch me in his arms,

Grateful to see my cheerful young smile

And listen to the activities of my day.

Now I see him standing stolen in the window,

His face blurred by the rivulets of rain,

His hand propelling me toward work--Waiting...until I come back again.

This reminiscence brings nostalgia.

We are no longer two bodies who partake 

In a recycled ordinary routine.

The innocence of childhood understanding--

Diminished by my adult mind,

Is cloistered by years of covert training:

To sever my life to avoid rejection.

Where did our easy comraderie go?

It fell through the crags and cracks

Of our meager connection-- depleted 

The chasm of relating is widened

Where neither know how to cross the divide.

Preconceived reactions will ignite 

There embittered strife into flames.

Love, being ill defined, causes wounds

Too naked and ravaged to keep immured.

<mbw 

Atonement by Ian McEwan

I just started reading this book today and it's beginning surprised me. It was original and different in a way that really made regard what I was reading with new eyes. The different perspectives that the author shows is in some ways nascent in form from what I usually read. The way Briony Tallis regards the art of story telling and how she interprets life caused me to question my own writing and its real purpose. 

Here is a quote that really set my mind thinking: "She need only show separate minds, as alive as her own, struggling with the idea that other minds were equally alive. It wasn't only wickedness and scheming that made people unhappy, it was confusion and misunderstanding; above all, it was failure to grasp the simple truth that other people are as real as you."

This concept of the human struggle being aptly described by a fictional thirteen year old baffled me. Here I am twenty-one and I don't even think about these types of things.  Where has the inquisitive young minds apt to learn about the human condition gone? Have we truly devolved to such a state that we don't even think about what drives our actions, stories, believes, even our lives?