Mandatory Heart

A Review of Cory Barrett's ... ' Mandatory Meeting '

Agony is the bitter fruit of care. In … ' Mandatory Meeting ' … Cory Barrett takes us through the eyes of an observer of the world … probably in church … to visit with the travails of life. And its a life … in which Cory finds … himself trapped in a corner … owing to the fresh paint on the floor of his youth. And yet … the solution he presents … fails to soothe his care. For he is missing his spot at the pulpit.

 

As a message … his poem cuts through the dross … of eyes shut to solutions. ' Did you watch the eyes release their stare of captivity … .' But captive from what? A trek through the needle's eye of virtuous achievement perhaps … undertaken with devotion and piety. 'The scent of hypnosis pushing apathy through a needle's eye.' Does devotion therefore equal self hypnosis? It does raise a curious thought about devotion … many suspect … but seldom bring themselves to express.

 

Cory boldly raises the lid on his own faith … and brings into inference … the sweet visions of his own life … lived among a society … that has raised a thorn bush … around his expectations of the good life. And hence his agony … in having subscribed to that life … lived its tenets … drank in its tea of ideals … and finding himself uncomfortable in the house … before the graveyard of stones. He must certainly be wondering … what to do next.

 

' Did you wonder what the woman next to you is spinning her web with?' … he asks in the absent nature of someone who is no longer there. And such is the state he has been brought to … by the social imperatives of society … family … and wife. Certainly he borrows from his relations with women … regarding their penchant for spinning webs … in his present position.  And what a web it is … he seems to be saying … that traps the social population … in its web of beliefs … more potent than the word of God.

 

No doubt Cory has seen the sacred heart … the one with thorns around it. He is certainly expressing his state of being in it well. ' … bent elbows, forearms guarding the hope of believers.' And so its surprising to find that … he ends his poem with the story of Lot leaving the stricken city … of Sodom … when his wife overcomes her resistance … to take one last look at the city. ' … recognizing the pillars of salt around them.' Its obviously a message of escapism … from a bind that we cannot release ourselves from.

 

It makes the presumption that … our hurt and injury … is also our only salvation of hope … if we continue to guard it. But if we continue to escape … perhaps the message at the pulpit … ought to have spoken of … turning around our fears … our hurt … into an experience of discovery about ourselves. But we don't really know if it was that. We are instead … brought into a second sermon … in the pews … about self hypnosis … and the youthful declaration of vision … not at peace in church.

 

A heart in agony may lack the insight into its own solutions … if it continues to escape from it. That message is clear from the poem. It hits hard at the ' … minds and ears slumbering to the lullaby … .' And it does that with the mind of youth … that was born free but came to be imprisoned in the society it was born in. Perhaps its simply his defense of himself … and his plough of discontent … at the people who continue to propagate such a condition for others.

 

Does such willful ploughing … justify itself … especially when combined with the charm … innocence … and grace … of a mind viewing everything in a fresh perspective? A person who has lived his life with faith … and right conduct would lament that others are not … and that robs him of the beauty of the world … he worked so hard to enjoy. And if those people share the same platform with him … at church … would he question their actions then? He appears to be doing just that.

 

 I know what such …  right living of youth  … did to my own hypnosis of self content. I was simply listening to rock and roll … reading Marvel comics … and watching John Wayne … when I realized that its more than the … web I was living on … to avoid … ' the bitter tang of disdain.' That raised the hurt in my sacred heart … to a point more than I could bear. So I  broke the mold … and went out into the world in search of answers. I didn't wait for someone else to tell me how. I learnt that later.

 

In the legend of William Tell … the father shot an apple … off the head of his own son … and convinced his detractors … of the precision of his beliefs. Obviously Cory must have had an apple shot off his head. He knows that truth exists … and a man may apply himself to achieve its fulfillment … but he appears less adept at shooting it off his own son. He ought to give it a try … and discover why one man's realization … means so much. And why it would mean even more … if he could bring the same message to others … past his bush of thorns.

 

When God … handed David over to the Assyrians … the man fought to convince his enemies of his ways … and became their confidant. Its harder to do that when you are living with your friends. ' Whatever her distraction, it bends her to open twisted cage of her arms,exposing a heart open to travelers.' Did it actually bend her? We could all learn from that … it must be what comes from living as a pillar of salt … adding some taste to every dish. 

 

' Mandatory meeting ' … tells us that its important … perhaps even mandatory … that we meet with our needs for salvation. Our ignorance of the hurt we bring … to the young or new generation … is just the beginning of the way we hurt ourselves. We need to awake from our lullaby of  comfort … that comes from our own surmoning. By Gad! We live lives of such sweet contradictions.