Epiphany

("Eye of Storm", original encaustic, 2017) Epiphany I’ve had two major epiphanies in my life, And I figure three is all we really get. So far they are following a pattern Of thesis/antithesis So I assume the third will be some kind of synthesis. The first involved pain. When I broke my femur in a climbing accident I had some time to consider pain And I concluded that it can always be worse As in, it’s never a full 10 on the scale. The second was a couple of years later With my second climbing accident When I did a 40 foot backwards swan dive Landing on rock, cracking my helmet Instead of my skull. What I learned when I woke up several hours later In a hospital far from home Was that no matter how much pain we experience When we die it ends As if it never had been… I think the third when it comes at last Will be something along the lines; I really don’t know sh*t And never have Despite a lifetime thinking otherwise. I think it’s an epiphany To enter an open door with Regardless of what’s come before Somehow knowing it’ll all be familiar The way dreams are, just before we awake. (5/27/24)