...inferno of passions... Jung

A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them. As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being. Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.  

― C.G. Jung

illustration from The Red Book

Poem: Smiles of a Summer Night

The Times' Sunday Magazine included a tribute to Ingmar Bergman shortly after his death. He'd taken years to connect gut and body, to weather a personal climate of emotions. Finding purchase on myself was similar; a long haul. I remember being fascinated with the life cycle, care and feeding of emotions--how were they ingested and released? Were we all supposed to feel? Feel? I had not a clue.

The other notable Bergman/Sarai connection is strawberries. Best dessert of childhood--from my all-Swede ma (born in Queens): strawberries smashed on buttered bread and sprinkled with sugar.

Smiles of a Summer Night

Until age 39,
Ingmar Bergman
couldn’t feel,
and then I’d bet
sluice gates
were spared
a flood. In
mysterious space,
Earth sets back of Moon.
Planets notably hang,
or glide ellipses,
without rest, with-
out holidays or joy.

It isn’t so bad,
being human.

I was 34 when I
noncomprehended
my cartographer’s
etched landform
bobbing in waters
restless with monsters.
I was mass, the equal
of height and weight.
I floated, hemispheric,
in myself. No sluice
here either, but,
with age, something
to educate dreams.
Rest, Ingmar Bergman, now silent and learning.

Sarah Sarai; pub. in Flaneur Foundry, 2009

& included in The Future Is Happy, available from SPD or Amazon.