
All these judgments,
breaking the surface—
slippery,
too many to hold,
each one spilling back
to the same, old,
familiar edge,
the worn track of a
ripple-soled shoe.
There’s comfort in feeling lost,
I think.
Comfort in the disorientation.
I call it my “slave self”—this ego,
splinters of me moving on their own,
not listening,
not savoring,
missing the beauty so near,
as if they live only to pull the strings.
Their purpose,
I suspect, is to find relief—
relief from ancestors,
I feel,
who siphon my energy
like hungry children,
who, even now,
reach through my skin,
hoping I won’t end up like them—
Dead.
Lost.
Dead still and lost still.
To pour so many selves
into the single, real me—
it feels like an impossible feat,
a tightrope,
or a pinprick—
living for that single, infinitesimal point—
the center where all of me springs to life,
where even the “slave self” dissolves,
folding gently, and again,
into self-sovereignty.
The Dissolution of Ego
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