-- The Value of Opposites --

by John Herlihy

We do find things in the oddest places,

Things evident in the thinnest of traces.

Opposites hold its opposite embedded,

In happiest moments, sadness dreaded.

Courage found in the depths of our fear,

The darkest hour makes dawn light clear.

There within us amid fearsome reaches,

Our courage lifts its head and beseeches.

The harshest noise makes silence profound,

Snow’s silence speaks as it falls to the ground.

Silence itself waits for the beauty of sound,

Sighs of the wind inspire thoughts profound.

Hope offers feelings of sweet anticipation,

Despair offers feelings of raw trepidation.

In the music of hope lie whispers of despair,

In the dirge of despair, hope send up a flare.

Arrival lays claim to the beauty of patience,

Haste only proves the futility of impatience.

To wait patiently and attentively at the gate,

Knowing our destiny may invoke such a wait.

What utility the dawn if it can never arrive,

The day never to end, only light to survive.

Twilight serves us as harbinger of the night,

Lending its darkness to the mystery of light.

Love finds joy in the loved one’s presence,

Love’s longing in the loved one’s absence.

Absence itself can offer a source of delight,

Memory of the loved one vivid and bright.

In the inferno of chaos lies a potential spark,

its power reduces chaos by its simple mark.

An orderless chaos induces a desire for calm,

While calm’s serenity echoes as sacred psalm.

The value of success would have little flavor,

Without the possibility of our certain failure.

Let our failure enjoy its little moment stark,

So that success imprints on our soul its mark.

In the fulness of life lies the specter of death,

That arrives at any moment with any breath.

Death makes the impermanence of life a reality,

Life makes the importance of death a mystery.

We should never all life’s opposites question,

Each one of them makes its own impression.

A negative opposite contains its own flavor,

So that we may valued opposites truly savor.

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Copyright © John Herlihy

Saturday 25 January 2025