Thoughts on the poem "excavation"

Here is an excerpt from a conversation about the poem I posted a few days ago, "excavation." If you don't enjoy reading explanations of poetry you might want to skip this one. :)

Here is the link to the piece: Click Here to Read "excavation"

"Lately I've been thinking about how many of us start life optimistic, ready to tackle the wars of the world. That optimism lasts until the battle that sinks us. We fall in agony, trying to learn not to hope because we don't want to ever hurt so badly again. Here and there, little circumstances arise, nosing up old dreams; but we push them away, letting them settle. Slowly, we allow ourselves to be named/defined by our loss. We become dull-hearted. We live forfeitted lives.

This lasts until the explosion that excavates everything. Old pains and fears emerge, rise to the surface. And yet, we are not lifted yet to the sun. We are allowed to sit in the dark cold for a while, waiting with all of our hauntings. It is here that I ask God, "Why did you allow this to awaken again if you weren't going to lift me out of it?"

I've been reading T.S. Eliot this week, and he mentions that we should not hope, for we hope in the wrong things. We should not love, for we love the wrong things. There is only faith, and waiting is a part of that. Those prayers prayed at the bottom of the ocean... aren't they terrible, and beautiful, and honest? The rawness of such need implies filling must exist in the universe. The vacuum signifies."


---- Becca