Survival of the Peregrine

"The deep, deep turbulence a man can have -- Compelled to see himself; a moving world, Impinging, hitting, charming -- at one time, The selfsame moment, by the selfsame mind. Complacency at least is fought by him. Who asks what flesh can do to formal thought -- And keeps asking, in the smoke and sun. We must see lusciousness in thought --The pale Madonna in the hot desire. The need is sterner now than ever; now our self respect demands, demands We place the viscera with logic, time."

anonymous




I have had the layers of my identity stripped away until left naked and exposed. I feel distorted and unrecognizable, helpless with the few choices imposed on me; or so I thought. I resolved myself to reconsider faith and whether it was reasonable to entrust my soul to its fatality. My own faith, as it were, was born out of rebellion and irreverent indifference. I disdained sanctimony and acquiesced to existentialism. Uncertainty? What's that? I believed in the invincibility of reason. Disregarding the suspect fallibility of certainty and its insidious influence, nevertheless, I could dispatch ambivalence, fear even, with a mere gesture. I'd scowl at its suggestion even now, if I could keep a straight face.

Well, my affliction is no longer audacity, is it? And if you reevaluate that alone, indeed, there is more at stake than just my physiology. What would be left of my soul? Has it become so twisted and schlerosed by a half century of objective and dispatch, conscripted in the regimen of conformity defined for me and accepted by my own dereliction or default? It doesn't matter really, it seems I abdicated those choices long ago, when I submitted my imagination for complacency!

Perhaps, for that, there is retribution in illness; a chance to confront my transgression and, to that end, avoid my own annihilation. A life endured without purpose only directive is surrender, no longer sustained by the creativity I revere so. I fear the insipidly pedestrian, the vapid conformity that is the contented rhythm en masse, as predictable as the tide; back and forth with hypnotic inevitability. Cancer hasn't done that to me! It appears I've been giving that away all by myself!

For all my peregrinations,as of late, if I can address that alone; my survival is assured, regardless what happens to my body. To that end I want to create a new imperative; to be well, to rejoice in immediacy, to feel joy in spite of my circumstances and even because of them.

I want to reconcile the fear and doubt we all experience and need to share. Conditions common to us all, that only varies in intensity for some of us, for others, too much to endure; alone. Collaborative voices with a language determined to tear away the mask of ambiguity and expose that it is only apprehension that we torture ourselves with. That in fact,our dignity, and yes, even our soul is intact and together we can revel in self-discovery.

My exclusivity is cancer, but discourse will reveal commonality amongst a vast collective struggling to find understanding and faith and acceptance and ultimately survival.