L’Enfant Sauvage

Before I had words,

I knew not what I was.

Time was not yet born;

Warmth and light, whose

Source was neither far,

Nor close, danced around me,

With me, for me, though

“Me” was not yet a drop

Separate from the sea.

I was as the babe that

Knows not itself from

Its mother, but is held

Steadfast in a bond immutable.

Tied as a leaf is tied to a tree,

Yet afloat and unfixed as the

Dust in the wind, I was, without

Knowing it, alive and free.

I have now what I did not:

Words that tell me what

I was, but now, I am not. 

Reviews

[Fabian G. Franklin]

I think we still "are". I believe it's just we are in a sort of "physical" limbo with our hearts trapped behind the iron bars of our ribs...the love; wanting and waiting to be free again. But we can reach out, spiritually, from inside. It's exactly what we are doing here with our poems and scribblings and stories; reaching out from inside hoping to touch the hearts and minds of others. Wonderfully written, my friend.

[Laz K.]

Yes, trying to reach out and touch something we had, lost, but can regain again. Paradise lost...and found.

Thank you for your always inspiring and insightful comments!

[Fabian G. Franklin]

Ah, Milton. I am familiar. But he also wrote. "Paradise Regained". About Milton, he and I are both Children of December or Sagittarians. I don't adhere to astrology but I do think the times of year in which we are born influence our personalities to some degree. In my own life (I'm in my mid-sixties) I've met quite a few friends born around the same time of year as myself. It's been an ongoing conundrum to me that we should randomly share so many traits and similarities. I don't think the universe or God does anything randomly. I believe everything has a purpose.

[Lorry]

I wonder why everything is so easy as a kid, without knowledge of how the world works, yet as soon as that knowledge begins seeping into us, our childhood is effectively over and we spent too much time saying or thinking how unfair the "rules" are.
Perhaps the self gets consumed by knowing how the rules are so unfair, yet they don't give a voice to the ones who know true sense, fair from unfair.
Let's face it, if we voted child X president, would he or she really do a worse job?
We still are, buy only from the memories of when we knew real things, likely innocence and fairness.
Thought provoking write my friend.

[jacob erin-cilberto]

I wonder if we were really free when we were younger and not free now.
I have found at my age that I feel more free to be me...but maybe I am not free because I have spent too many years being ruled by the establishment.
Just can't break away from something.
j.

[Laz K.]

ignorance is bliss. adam and eve (as mythical figures, symbols) were "innocent" (of knowledge of what's good and evil) in the "garden." the moment their eyes were open was the moment they started a long journey of "gaining knowledge" but in that moment, they also lost what they had. what is better, to be something or to know something about that state of being, but not possessing it anymore? history has been a long, arduous journey into discovering the complexity of ourselves and the world, but it has not been making us "happier" (arguable point, though). what is the "return to innocence"? learning more, or unlearning what we have learned?

anyway, thank you for reading and commenting. :)