The Sphinx and the Traveller

“Riddle me this,”

Said the Sphinx to the traveler,

“Where have you been?

Where are you now?

And where will you go?”

“Oh, the answer is easy,”

Said the traveler with a glint in his eye,

“I’ve been in the past

Now I’ve seen the truth

And I’ll go on to the future with pride.”

The Sphinx shook her head

Then heaved a sad sigh,

“I wish you were right,

But, alas, you are wrong

For you have never seen truth

Not once in your life.

You have never had faith

Nor trusted a single soul.”

The traveler laughed as he kicked the dust at his feet,

“My dear Sphinx,

I have trusted those I loved

And loved those I trusted.

Each one carries a piece of my soul

Wherever it is that they go.

All truth comes from them,

So who are you to tell me

My life has been a lie?”

Taking no particular offense

The Sphinx replied,

“You cannot trust another

Until you trust yourself

And you cannot trust yourself

Until you are honest with yourself

And you cannot consider yourself honest

Until you search the corners of your soul,

Find the deepest, darkest part,

Pull it into the light

And acknowledge that it is a part of you,

A piece of your very essence.

That fraction of your being

Remains hidden to this day.

Answer the question again:

Where have you been?

Where are you now?

And where will you go, traveler?”

By this time the traveler’s cheeks were wet

Stained with tears he’d refused to cry.

Faltering, he answered the Sphinx,

“I’ve been lying to myself;

Now pains long forgotten eat away at me

And I will go find someone to trust.”

Satisfied with this answer

The Sphinx allowed the traveler on his way,

Though she never did learn

If he finished his quest

Because the gods have no sense of humor,

Nor sympathy, nor empathy.

The greatest truth of all

Is that the Sphinx was just a tool

In a cosmic game of chess

That the traveler had no chance of winning.