fallen world

I dreamt of a fallen world.
In an act of exasperation with the condition of the world, I turned a corner so sharply that my shirt lapel physically clipped a man by the shoulder as I drove past him. The friction spun him on his heel and I saw the numbness in his face shrinking away in my rear view mirror.

His emotionless posture betrayed by the glimpse of precious dwindling reserves of humanity slipping from the glint in his eye. Pressing on, I felt sick for the both of us.

Later, as I entered the food building, that same man approached me and held a knife against me and I could see that it was his last remaining shred of human ego, not his beautiful soul, working to protect him from an existence dark, void, and senseless.

He couldn’t have been older than twenty-three, but his gnarly beard, tattered clothing, and sun-parched wrinkles spoke of more than a lifetime of trauma.
Yet I saw him as a scared child because I was a scared child and I knew he had goodness and I just wanted to connect with another light however dimly and briefly.

Clasping his blade between my palm and fingers and through tearfilled eyes, I begged him not to hurt me because I did not want his soul to bear the crushing weight of the harm of an awakened child, multiplying the karmic ripple of my earlier transgression.

Relating as two souls in a volatile world, I profusely apologized for my lack of compassion. By degrees, I felt the density change as he began to soften.

Having felt comfortable enough that I’d made an impression of truth and light on him and having nearly extracted the knife from his irresolute and feeble grip, I sheathed the blade and handed it back to him and asked him to come inside with me. He softened more and I could see he was ready to cast the final lots of his dwindling faith toward the opportunity for real communion as we passed the threshold together, leaving the shadow of the night behind us. 🤍