THE CLOSET MYSTIC

Like that old poet, I too walk by a chasm. Sometimes I peer over the edge— sometimes I dangle my feet— sometimes I throw rocks in and wait for a thud (I hear none). Like him, I am fated to fall in one day. 

But sometimes, I wish I could jump in and free fall. That’s the thing about that pit: there is no bottom. You’re falling for certain, but rock bottom is a place reserved for people who have an end to their madness. No bottom exists in this pit. 

Sometimes I wish I could give myself to the neurosis, to that dark space within. No matter how well-adjusted I seem, I always carry that blizzard— that place of chaos. 

I know not a poet nor tormented artist that does not carry that chasm within them, too. I think it’s common to all of us. The gift of the artist is in channeling that madness— a controlled free-fall. I think the only artist doomed to fall in early is the one who does not channel the pit into their work.

Write a poem and throw it into the pit, it requires tribute. If you do not throw your art into it, its sickly-sweet siren song will beckon until either you or your creations fall in; yes, it demands one or the other. Indeed, the void will call— how will you answer?