The Conditions of Past Tests

There's a point of convergence in life - a dialectic that comes to a fruition of possibilities, or rather, may ignite further possibilities. I come to a trapped node of consciousness that forks out beyond myself; beyond knowing, beyond yearning, beyond lacking. Here at this centre of being, I contemplate - I meditate.

Coming so close to the end of the year, I am inundated with thoughts of the future. This phenomenon of planning, goal-seeking, life-making habit of human beings is an irritating disposition. But before we leap across a chasm of incomprehensibilities, I seek the reflected image of myself. In this metaphysical pool of being, I saw the tested mettle of patience, ardour, stamina, endurance and courage.

Patience: The ability of one's self to withstand provocation, misfortune, pain and love. It is the test of composure, the catechism of persistence, and the examination of sufferance. Patience wrought the metaphysical ley-lines of my life like the rhizomatic madness of bog trees. Each mishapen root simply branch out-toward space without a care of the barriers that reality conjures. And so I walk through the extremities of pain - emotional and physical - so that I may come to (with)stand - scathed and maimed - and spit at the sky in contempt and ecstasy. In this I have always been tested and succeeded.

Ardour: The very constituent of desire, passion and affectivities. It is amour, fervour, zeal and inconsolable burning of the loins. For this I call upon it a malediction, a bane, an objuration of pain beyond physical limits. Indeed, and contradictorily, ardour is the point for escape; it is the condition to free from the bastion of the body; it transgresses the physical capacities for lust. For in the transgression of the physical we come to know the unlimited expanses of love. But herein lies my plight for I am always sutured before, and always before, the limits of expression - of love. Herein I am recumbent on a bed of broken glass, each pressing its jagged edge on soft skin, testing - always testing - the mettle of patience. For when will I come to free myself? When will that edge present itself for my suicide? Who will lead me to transgress? I am still tested.

Stamina: The expression of drudgery; of a mule that hopes to lick the carrot before itself. It is the making of endurance, the structure of power and will. For in stamina one is levelled with others - your peers, friends, relatives and lovers. What are one's reserves which could brace and prevail against anxiety, aggression, maliciousness, and intolerability? Stamina strikes the anvil and spreads the dust of life's fire across the floor. Stamina is the hammer that will scrape and scrape the steel of oneself until all that is left is a tempered and forged weapon of reckoning. This test is but a beginning of my ordeals - a trial that has just been initiated.

Endurance: How long could one last? Last against hardship, stress, expectations, and existence in general. This is when the breaks are on one's fingers, the nails between the crevices of nails, knife through and within organs that cramp affectivities. Yes... in endurance is sadomasochism. Endurance carves itself through our skin and into the very heart of each being. Could we understand that in which we desire without first going through the misery of understanding? In the mastery of ardour is also the mastery of endurance. This is the test of vitality.

And finally Courage: To face no body - that is the final fear. The expectation of facing someone could meet lasciviousness, horror, anxiety, love, compassion, and even peace. To face no bodies, nothing - ever - is to lack humanity. Do you brave the conditions of being inhumane? Do you have the courage to disassociate from the conditions of patience, ardour, stamina and endurance? For in all these conditions there is the 'other' - the person, the human - is always present even if invisible. In courage is the metaphysical quality of mind and spirit that enables the forging through, and the detonation through, people. In courage we face enemies and antagonists. But where is courage to be alone? I have none. I realise this this year. I have a lack of courage. I am always surrounded by beings of every nature. I lack courage for no bodies. This test I failed before it has even begun.


And so my past is manacled by these conditions of being: these five strands that twist and meander through the physical and mental capacities of my existence. In my vocation as an academic, I wait patiently for an institution that would pick me from the rubble of prostitution while enduring the limited expression of one's value. In ardour I skip the tip of waves and plunge into the depths of affectivities. Though I have stamina to withstand the cold depths of emotions, I have yet to master endurance for I cannot be hurt too long. And in my grandmother's death I learned courage for I cannot live without bodies. I learned that I lack the courage to lose bodies and in this I shall strive to empower. For one day we must have the courage to lose and be lost.