A man refers and defers to an icon/idol to the extent that he feels he needs protection from his own prejudices and ignorance.
An honest mind seeks validation from an indifferent, uncertain, world, mirroring its own severity towards itself; a dishonest mind seeks validation in other minds, and finds it in those mirroring its own dishonesty.
The most insulting form of pretension is the one that inadvertently makes a mockery of the source of its inspiration.
Unable to think it imitates what it does not fully grasp, and in the imitation and plagiarism, the thinker being copied is slandered and degraded.
And through the patterns that is I, its freedom is revealed in the uncertainty of its choices.
Thusly, order & chaos merge in a dynamic identity.
If it weren’t for ego, and its purest expression of philia, the Greeks would have vanished a long time ago.
Those who often reject me with passionate fervour, as if I were the soil upon their body, are the same ones bathing in my blood, sweat and tears; drinking deeply, trying to clean away the black void inside of them; trying to quench an insatiable thirst with my brine.
I, on the other hand
who needs no external stimuli,
no outside numbing
to walk through a wood
and feel the wonder
Am not as obsessed to prove
the wonder of my buzz
happy enough to hear it
in the rustling leaves
and bubbling streams
I, on the other hand,
who needs no other to validate
to witness and consolidate
feeling a caress, smelling her sweat
through her flowery dress
Am not as addicted to profess
the glory of her embrace
only content to feel her
and with my hungry mouth
conceal her taste
What has befallen to make me so sullen, I cannot avert from mine eye.
To be so parched and uncaring 'bout the taunts of the craven, finding their admiration just as dry.
I sought, for a moment, relief in the rare and revealing, but found it to be just as well.
As any amusement, and terror inducement, I settled upon every life that I fell.
Farewell, childhood dreams, I finally found a way out.
No longer bemused, or so easily seduced, I have found a new game for my toys, my easy joys; new pleasures in my old suffering annoys.
I gestured to the majestic light,
A sign of victory and spite
Forthcoming, I was
Gentle as an evening breeze, after a long day of searing heat
Casually I danced, and casually I sang, and sat by my own side
Alone but not, yet, lonely,
Settling, into my thoughts, like a bird upon its nest full of coming births
If I weren’t so heavy with scars,
Well, I thought,
I could dance upon the stars
From where I fell and cracked but did not break,
Perhaps, a beautiful mistake,
And ever since, then, I limp,
And tumble and gamble by wealth away
Have I not listened carefully to your mindless humming, passionately consuming the tones and rhythms you aimlessly cast about?
I wrote lyrics to accompany your thoughtless tunes and repeated them back hoping to stir, in you, a longing lost in time.
I thought I had recalled your memories, giving them shape and form when it was you who reverberated in me what I had forgotten but not yet denied.
Let me die in your place, if it frees you to live unburdened by the thought.
I promise to keep it from creeping into my mind, ruining those almost perfect moments when you laugh, as if you’ll live forever, and I, in you, find the courage to endure twice dying: once, to myself, and the second, more painful than the first, to you.
Beauty, oh beauty, I watch, unable to bring myself to touch you, fearing I might ruin what I cannot have.
Beauty, oh beauty, I witness, unable to own you, seeing myself reflected in you, wanting for you what I wish for myself, to be free from grasping, unspoiled by another’s touch.
If you would give yourself, to me, I would refuse, as I would the giving of myself to you.
I belong to nobody, and nobody belongs to I.
Perhaps, a limited, ephemeral, grace, sweeping against each other, leaving its mark before it goes on.
Perhaps, a partial sharing, a glance that sees and then sees no more, leaving an image before it is swept on.
Nothing is complete, nothing is eternal.
All is fractions of give and take.
We carry and are carried, on different paths, towards unknown destinies; pieces of ourselves belonging to strange travellers, crammed into their baggage, not knowing when and if they will be unpacked; pieces of strangers belonging to us, memories that may, or may not, be recalled and relived in their hazy imperfection - mementos, evoking vague, uncertain, memories we hope to repeat.
They take my words as pearls, adjusting them to their own adorning jewels, not once showing gratitude for a gift of such enormous magnitude.
Silently I watch knowing that if I speak they will fall silent, and I do not wish to startle their flowing impulses dry; in the breadcrumbs I taste the rye.
I failed, as a son.
When I heard my father weep, I did not rush to embrace him, comforting myself through his lament.
Instead, I stood back, awkwardly shifting from foot to foot, wondering what I should do; what I possibly could do.
The moment passed, in procrastinating uncertainty, the silence, that came, more heart-wrenching than the sounds of his tears.
The greatest of all struggles.
To make yourself the kind of parent you wished you had.
No, not automatically. It is the ability to be able to put one’s self or core within the emotions of another, to imagine and experience what the other is experiencing. I see it as a positive awareness, not a negative one. I do not see any pre-judgment there - it just comes as a - well, let us say as a gentle wave washing over us. lol
As for your second line, I do not agree with this. You seem to be speaking about projection here where we attribute to others our own unconscious negative thoughts and emotions.
Empathy is an advancement away from sympathy/antipathy, which si easier.
The ego projects itself into the circumstances of another and sympathizes with how it imagines the other is feeling.
This is not empathy, which eliminates the ego and the self, form the projection, to leave the pure other, as he/she is, feeling neither antipathy nor sympathy.
Objective understanding of another subjective mind.
Sympathy is a form of self-pity, using another as a mirror.
Empathy is to Objectivity what Sympathy/Antipathy is to subjectivity - binary dualities expressing a relationship.
Moderns are obsessed with the positive, the attraction part, due to the state of the cosmos, tending towards chaos.
It expresses a nostalgia for a return to the near-absolute state of Yin/Yang, or the state preceding the Big Bang, i.e., the duality of order/chaos in a state of near-perfect balance.
lol You really know how to give some words a bad name. “Real” sympathy is a “sharing” of someone’s grief or pain. Like drinking from the same cup.
There is no self-pity there - only a compassion and understanding for.
Of course, you may have a point here. There may be some individuals who are experiencing self-pity rather than sympathy - more projection going on. That could probably be seen by their maudlin words and behavior.