This article was inspired and motivated by the poem titled "To My Fellow Sojourners" by Joseph* ~ OneLight*® Authors & Creations (as author Joseph Randell Sherman signs some of his written and photographic works). What those who may visit this page will actually read, is a transcription of the review I wrote to that very poem, posted yesterday in AuthorsDen, to which I add the full version (original and translation) of a poem I quoted therein - "Cântico Negro" ("Black Chant") by an extraordinary poet, José Maria dos Reis Pereira, who signed his creations as José Régio, and whom many of you may have read before and may therefore enjoy revisiting through one of his most charismatic poems, or whom maybe you never heard of, and may thus enjoy discovering.

I titled this reflection "Sojourn ~ An Open Path", in the hope that those who may read it will do so with an open mind, and will perceive this very page as an Open Door itself to that Path - open to other perspectives, open to welcome those who come to visit, and again if they wish to return, open to bid them farewell as they leave and to wish them a good journey, open, even, to those who may choose not to cross its threshold and decide to remain "outside", open to comments, open to silence. Gratefully and humbly open, with Love&Light*, even to any other Sojourners who may perceive my awareness of Love&Light* as contrary to their own. 

So, with Love&Light* as it is gratefully and humbly perceived in the mind and spirit of this Sojourner, here is my open reflection:

 

This interesting poem ("To my Fellow Sojourners", by Joseph* ~ OneLight*® Authors & Creations) certainly ellicits a lot of reflections. By dedicating it to his fellow sojourners, the author is recognizing a common denominator, which is that we are all headed "somewhere"; Whatever the definition or designation which may be given to this "somewhere", we are all sojourners towards a common destination which no being can avert, because it is an intrinsic part of the being's very nature.

On the other hand, even if all are inevitably headed towards a common destination, and even if at many points paths, directions taken, may converge, the fact is that essentially each one of us is really following their own path and walking upon it with their own steps.

There are points when each one of us may need or believe they need to be carried, out of exhaustion, laziness or sickness, or any other cause of an impaired stride - and there's an infinity of such causes, both objective and subjective - but even while being carried each one of us is still, primarily and ultimately, following their own individual path, for no one can truly reach our destination for us, although all will reach it with us and us with them, at each one's own pace and in each one's own time.

As Fellow Sojourners, we will find all sorts of different approaches, of different perspectives concerning the path which we all are travelling. We will find those that seem so absolutely secure of the goodness of the path they're following, that they will not acknowledge, least of all accept, that there may be other alternatives, and that such path that seems perfect beyond any argument to their own perception, may actually be inadequate to other sojourners with diverse perceptions and diverse perspectives; We will find those who will, out of their own insecurity, make the sojourn difficult to others, by sending distorted or mixed signals about imagined (or perceived as real) perils, obstacles and threats along the way, which, in the next moment, turn into imagined (or perceived as real) glorious, beautiful, smooth sections of the same path; We will find many others, and we will be part of the Whole, and yet we will still be "one" segment of that same Whole. All will shout, all will whisper, all will sing, all will laugh or will cry, all will remain silent at some point or other of the Sojourn.

And many will, at some point or other, probably need to "stop" - although there is really no definitive stop to this journey, for not even after each arrival to the common destination does the Journey end - and reconsider the path they have been following or the pace at which they have been travelling. And it is very possible that, at such point, many of those sojourners will address the currents of other fellow sojourners with an expression of that moment of their own journey that may be very similar to this - " I don’t know which way I’m going,
I don’t know where I’m going,
- I know that I’m not going that way!" - Because, ultimately, along this Journey, "I go only where

my own steps will take me…" (Both quotes are of the extraordinary poem "Cântico Negro" - "Black Chant" - by José Régio).

May my and your steps always be guided by the same respect of the steps chosen by our fellow sojourners as I wish theirs may be, regarding your steps and my own.

© 2006 Alexandra* OneLight*® Authors & Creations

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Cântico Negro

"Vem por aqui" - dizem-me alguns com olhos doces,
Estendendo-me os braços, e seguros
De que seria bom que eu os ouvisse
Quando me dizem: "vem por aqui"!
Eu olho-os com olhos lassos,
(Há, nos meus olhos, ironias e cansaços)
E cruzo os braços,
E nunca vou por ali...
Não, não vou por aí! Só vou por onde
Me levam meus próprios passos...

Se ao que busco saber nenhum de vós responde,
Por que me repetis: "vem por aqui"?
Prefiro escorregar nos becos lamacentos,
Redemoinhar aos ventos,
Como farrapos, arrastar os pés sangrentos,
A ir por aí...
Como, pois, sereis vós
Que me dareis impulsos, ferramentas, e coragem
Para eu derrubar os meus obstáculos?...
Corre, nas veias, sangue velho dos avós,
E vós amais o que é fácil!
Eu amo o Longe e a Miragem,
Amo os abismos, as torrentes, os desertos...

Ide! tendes estradas,
Tendes jardins, tendes canteiros,
Tendes pátrias, tendes tectos,
E tendes regras, e tratados, e filósofos, e sábios.
Eu tenho a minha loucura!
Levanto-a, como um facho, a arder na noite escura,
E sinto espuma, e sangue, e cânticos nos lábios...

Deus e o Diabo é que me guiam, mais ninguém.
Todos tiveram pai, todos tiveram mãe;
Mas eu, que nunca princípio nem acabo,
Nasci do amor que há entre Deus e o Diabo.

Ah, que ninguém me dê piedosas intenções!
Ninguém me peça definições!
Ninguém me diga: "vem por aqui"!
A minha vida é um vendaval que se soltou.
É uma onda que se alevantou.
É um átomo a mais que se animou...
Não se por onde vou,
Não sei para onde vou,
-Sei que não vou por aí!

José Régio, Poemas de Deus e do Diabo, Brasília Editora, 10ª edição, Lisboa 1984

Black Chant

“Come this way” – some tell me with sweet eyes,
opening their arms to me, so sure
that it would be good if I listened to them
when they tell me: “Come this way”!
I look at them with lassitude in my eyes,
(there are, in my eyes, ironies and weariness)

And I fold my arms,
and never go that way…

No, I’m not going that way! I go only where
my own steps will take me…

If, to what I seek to know, none of you are responding,
why do you repeat: “Come this way”?

I would rather slip on muddy alleys,
whirl in the winds
like rags, and drag bloody feet,
than go that way…
How will you thus be the ones
to give me the impulse, the tools, and the courage
to overcome my own obstacles?

Runs through the veins the ancient blood of forefathers,
and you love what is easy!
I love the Distant and the Mirage,
love the abysses, torrents and deserts…

Go on! You have roads,
you have gardens, flowerbeds,
you have homelands, you have roofs,
and you have rules, and treaties, and philosophers, and wise men.
I have my madness!
I rise it, like a torch, ablaze in the twilight,
and I feel foam, and blood, and chants on my lips…

God and the Devil are my guides, no one else.
All have had a father, all have had a mother,
but I, who do not begin and do not end,
was born from the love that is made between God and the Devil.

Ah, let no one give me pious intentions!
Let no one ask me for definitions!
Let no one tell me: “Come this way”!
My life is a storm unleashed,
a wave that crested,
one more atom animated…
I don’t know which way I’m going,
I don’t know where I’m going,
- I know that I’m not going that way!

José Régio, Poems of God and the Devil, Brasília Editora, 10th edition, Lisbon 1984

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