FROM A DARK WOOD

With tired eyes, I had walked into my fifties carrying a familiar, heavy load of grief and despair. I first came to know it well back in my late teen years and had somehow managed to drag it around with me for the next thirty. It had existed rather benignly, although I always knew it was there.

This time around mid-life was the trigger, and everything of value that could be lost, was lost.

I came to know of Dante’s La Commedia, where the opening line translates from the original Tuscan dialect as: “In the middle of the road of my life, I awoke in a dark wood where the true way was wholly lost.” It seemed that nothing could be more befitting. I was in a very dark place.

And while I could hardly see, my passion for pursuing a creative life gave me some hope. Photographic art became a form of expression to help me navigate the dark. I began to wonder if the darkness of eyes was reflective in any way.

I still remember that day. I could barely breathe, placing my camera on a tripod and taking the self-portrait. I knew what was behind those eyes—the view out and the feelings within. I thought that the world could see me, that it could see in. Of course, it couldn’t.

There were deep tears, as there often were at the time. However, the tears were different; that overwhelming feeling of aloneness was accompanied by a pain that I no longer wished to endure.

If the world couldn’t see, I needed it to hear, and for that, I had to find my voice.