Infinity (Who Am I?)

Through pain, we witness a universal human experience

Infinity (Who Am I?)
By Courtney Hurd

“I can’t live with myself anymore!”
I cried out loud, kneeling on
The cold, tiled floor, with the water
Gushing into the tub to cover
The racking sound of my agony
As it poured out of my eyes
To drown me in my misery.

The strangeness of those words
Echoing through the fall of water
To hang before me in the steam.
Tentatively, I whispered
The question that filled my mind:
“If I cannot live with myself anymore,
Then who is this self with whom
I cannot stand to live?”

The epitome fell upon me
Like a piano from above
And crushed out the illusion
Of my core belief of self
It left behind a vacuum
Of wonder and relief.
A different world for me to explore
With newly awakened eyes.

I was not just a body living
Alone in this world �"
My feelings were my own,
But they did not belong to me alone;
No matter how many times people
Fall in or out of love,
No matter how many people
Feel the empty ache of loss,
It still feels like the first time,
Every time.

I was a mix of experience
A product of my past
Packaged up in cellophane expectations
And wrapped in plastic dreams.

My living, mortal body
Will suffer, age, and die
But within there is a counterpart
An ageless, deathless soul;
That which cannot be destroyed
Is transferred to another form.
Like the body consumed by flame
That is turned to smoke and ash and heat
Nothing is ever completely destroyed.

A part of me is infinite
A soul will never die
But will instead remain the essence
Of what I am inside.
A tiny part of this vital world,
A never-ending spark;
For that which cannot be destroyed
Is transferred to another form.

I am a part of this universe
A tiny sliver of god’s soul
In forgetting my individuality
I embrace universal unanimity
And found instead, immortality.

Reviews

[John the Baptist]

This one is very reminiscent of the experience of Eckhart Tolle, author of "The Power of Now." He too reached a moment where he felt he could not live with himself any longer, whereupon the same issues mentioned here occurred to him. Who is this self I can't live with? And who is watching that self? This type of experience is painful, but if its benefits are realized, they can forestall oceans of future pain.

[mattavelli]

Hello, Courtney! :)
This was an interesting read, and I really liked your plastic dreams. I swapped the word "epitome" with "epiphany". I enjoy reading this sort of introspective thinking, as it invites me to wallow in my own mind, and that is not an invitation that we often receive. Haha
I think death is okay. And, as I think that, I feel the dread, and my hand clenches just a bit.