Sunk in the mundane
like a pebble in a pond.
*
How rise up again?
*
**
*
Freddie Omm
Feast of the Ascension
21 May 2020
migrant, writer, work in progress
Sunk in the mundane
like a pebble in a pond.
*
How rise up again?
*
**
*
Freddie Omm
Feast of the Ascension
21 May 2020
Many possibilities exist for the pebble to rise: a cornucopia!
The most obvious is that a person steps into the pond and picks it up.
A current of water stirred by a storm could lift it.
Subterranean volcanic activity could vent out and impel it upwards.
In a blink of geological time, the pebble, like all “inanimate” matter, will rise, fall, merge, transmogrify a billion times.
Yes, there is a literal infinity of ways the pebble could rise – all of them of the Deus Ex Machina variety of course – the pebble, to our mundane minds, seeming unconscious and without personal volition (although I question that view, I know it’s the convention of the day).
One wonders whether Jesus Christ went of his own volition or whether he too was lifted by a Deus Ex Machina. The confused roles of the Trinity and his cry of crucified forsakenness make that a difficult point to settle. In The Islamic tradition, of course, Jesus did not die on the Cross before he ascended, but God lifted him before that death could happen.
But the pebble – conscious, volitive or not – is not necessarily a mere metaphor for the saviour – it is also one for consciousness of a certain sort, one sometimes emanated in a depression of the kind which many folks are feeling during the current pandemic.
This is beautiful, deep, thought-provoking. It has a lot of meaning packed in very few words.
Grazie, Becky. 😁
The pebble’s consciousness is debatable (as is the consciousness of all of us 😉 ).
And that debatability – its irreality, perhaps? – links it to the muddled, muddied consciousness of people in a state of depression.
The pebble (like the people) may be aware of the mud into which it has sunk at the pond’s bottom.
But the wider world, above, is invisible.
How indeed is it to rise, for all the potentialities Scarlett mentions, if it doesn’t desire to do so?
Desire indeed is the driver! Without a lust to breathe and interplay with the world beyond the pond, the pebble would remain locked down in its cold and lifeless muddy bed.
This is an absurd but disturbing way to trample on the Word of God, by positing the sin of Lust as the only Salvation, a truly Satanic abomination!
To the religious maniac / Imagination / Is an abomination.
“the muddled, muddied consciousness of people in a state of depression” which you identify in this Haiku /
Is also present in the Sonnet: “an empty beach in summertime” /
In which the perceptions of the Poetic Observer /
Make the temporary abandonment and emptiness /
Of the beach during lockdown /
Seem like permanent and timeless things /
When in fact they are the Projedtioms /
Of the Observer’s Depression.
Concise and thought-provoking
Thank you, Luisa! 😀
Some might think a pebble cannot rise / a studied lack of fantasy will suffice to make the little stone stay, eternal, unmoved, unmoving / but imagination is too marvellous, too wondrous to obey such tedious strictures /
Writing from Hong Kong today, existential themes float uppermost on the restless surface of my choppy mood.
Assuming a form of consciousness does exist in the pebble, it might feel safe and sheltered in the pond’s muddy bed.
It might not wish to rise and expose itself as, in pebbly terms, “a tall poppy apt to be lopped“ (as you yourself once put it, Freddie ! 😀).
It might, instead, want to savor its moment of peace and oneness with its surroundings.
This would be to resign oneself to Hell.
The poem, or haiku, does not specify that “the mundane” equates to hell.
To be stuck in the mundane is to be stuck in the world.
Hence, “to rise” is to escape the bounds of earth – for heaven, one assumes.
The way to do this is described in the Gospels and our Lord Jesus taught it.
This, and not the vain speculations in the other comments, is what Ascension is truly about.
At the risk /
(Very, very Real, I’m sure) /
Of a Divine Thunderbolt /
Might not your Savior /
Him- Her- It- Them-Self /
Be like this Pebble? /
In that Those Concerned /
With It (etc) are Them (etc) Selves
Stuck on Mundane Plains /
(As is the Pebbly Savior /
Therefore, Living Awareness /
Only in this World) /
Ability to Rise is /
Conferred by Faith Alone, Not /
By god the Unproved /
And Faith Being Human /
Is Earthy, Worldly, Mundane, /
Stuck like the Pebble.
The pebble sank and it is sunk.
Not “stuck”, necessarily, though! 🤨
“god the Unproved” is good!
Although “god Unproven” might be better
This haiku encapsulates the crisis of narrative of 21st century literature.
La pierre voudrait se soustraire aux lois de la pesanteur ? Impossible. Impossible, si le mal voulait s’allier avec le bien. C’est ce que je disais plus haut.
I disagree that this is impossible (see below).
Also, you do not say anything at all above.
Es war einmal ein Stein,
hat weder Kopf noch Bein.
Er sah die Menschen wetzen,
er sah die Menschen hetzen
und sah sie oft beim Denken
sich ihren Kopf verrenken,
und manche sah er holpern
und über sich wegstolpern
und dachte: Was hat so ein Leben für`n Sinn?
Der Mensch will immer woanders hin.
Warum nur … Fragezeichen,
es ist zum Steinerweichen.
Ich bin stets hier und niemals da
und kleiner als Amerika.
Ich bin von dieser Welt ein Stück,
und wo ich bin,
da ist das Glück.
Da kam der kleine Mattias Speck
und warf ihn im hohen Bogen weg.
Der Stein ist fortgeflogen …
In einem schönen Bogen …
Und sprach, als er gelandet war:
Bin immer hier und niemals da!
Und flüstert dann ganz leise:
Was sind wir Steine weise.
This haiku puts the Stone Paradox into my head.
Because, just as an omnipotent god could perform an illogical deed, such as drawing a square circle or creating a stone too heavy for them to lift, a pebble could be created which could lift itself from the muddy bed of a pond.
Ah yes, touché, René, I think you shall have the Last Word on this thread— Ça, mon âme, il faut partir!