The Secret Sharer

heaviness

Tupa and I have taken two long walks this weekend, and both of us are now the more tired for it. I think we've walked some 12-15 miles, taking in the reservoirs and pine forests surrounding them. We were very lucky to have nice weather although it was chilly at times as autumn seems finally to have arrived. Tupa has a sore back and my legs feel somewhat leaden. We'll begin short runs at the end of the week to move slowly towards longer runs.
I've decided (with Tupa's encouragement) to take two weeks off from working and educational concerns to relax and recharge my batteries. I started on Saturday and have to say that I enjoy it so far. I've been reading a funny book called S. by John Updike that is about a woman who goes to live in a religious commune similar to the one Osho had in Oregon in the 80's. She manages to bring her old life with her, and the letters she writes home are full of how she is still attached to this home. It's a great satire about lego-religions, although I must admit I 'm yearning to read something that really is a kick in the balls.
I realise that the last entry was somewhat heavy and incomplete, and so I'd like to think a little more about the woman who got into the truck and the resonance that still has for me. I read this poem on Saturday morning, and think it may illuminate what I was trying to say last time.

'Autumn in Gaol'

In autumn a friend
sent in an apple.
I made to eat it
all at once.
Red: too red.

In my palm, heavy:
Heavy as the world.

--Tsuboi Shigeji

'Heavy as the world' is what is most important as far as my own thinking is concerned. Last time I was thinking about drowning, and my mind immediately grasped at an intense sense-memory to reinforce the feeling of life. (The redness of the prisoner's apple, the scent of the woman.) Like the prisoner, I wanted to eat it all at once: I remember looking at her brown hair and soft brown skin and longing to touch it. Sense builds upon sense, and just adds to the feeling of longing. This longing has a heaviness of its own, and perhaps the heaviness of longing is parallel with the heaviness of mortality. Perhaps my memory of the perfumed japanese woman getting into the truck with me is just an escape of my contemplation of mortality (transference?). Perhaps there is no contrast at all, perhaps they are all part of the same web. What is life then? I'm not going to try to answer that question here, although I'll post something if I happen to have a sudden epiphany.....

posted by moor-rambler @ 5:25 AM