The time we are living through now is like the dark night of the soul that Theodore Roethke spoke of in his famous poem In a Dark Time. We are all living through a test of our mettle. What we choose to do with our limited time, in this critical moment, reveals the core of who we are. “In a dark time, the eye begins to see.”
I sit here typing my frustrations, tilting at windmills, as it were. At times I feel ready to take on the giants, to fight the entropy of society, and organize a movement. Viva la resistance!
At other times, the reality of the forces of darkness surrounding us becomes so overwhelming I just want to curl up and hide.
I sit here grappling with my thoughts. We are facing a battle—the same battle our ancestors fought and died for. To uphold the rights of our fellow citizens, to face down fear, to sacrifice for the cause of freedom. I ask: “What’s madness but nobility of soul at odds with circumstance?”
We are called, make no mistake. Those of us who feel the spirit of humanity’s better angels flowing through our veins—we are the type who cannot fully rest while ignorance and hatred thrive, while evil men plot to take away our rights. The day’s on fire!
I see lines appearing on my face and think: of course they appear now. The cause is taking the last remnants of the peaceful life I had hoped to lead. I have been fighting my entire life, against the odds, to get to where I am now. As a mother I have protected my children. At times I have related deeply to this passage: “I know the purity of pure despair.” I’ve made sacrifices to keep them safe, and I will continue to do so.
My heart is torn between the dream I once had of living peacefully and the certainty that we must all stand, or else the changes we are going through as a nation will be cemented.
Little by little, our heritage is being sold off and our country weakened. I once fully believed in the promises of America’s founding story, but that faith is being eroded like sand in the waves.
Now is the time to find out who we are. “A man goes far to find out what he is—death of the self in a long, tearless night, all natural shapes blazing unnatural light.”
I think: this is our dark night. The test of our mettle. Who we are as a people, and who we choose to be as a nation.
We are faced with the challenge of our lifetimes. “A fallen man, I climb out of my fear. The mind enters itself, and God the mind, and one is One, free in the tearing wind.”
