What I Experience

Even as a child my hands were strong enough to hold on to things. It got worse as I aged: I took more and more, and wouldn't release my grip on them. Eventually the things realized it was my will that they stay, and they settled deeply in my life, became one with my being. Do they actually belong there? Do they have substance only because they are meshed into me, body and soul? It's hard to fly, launching itself takes all of my available breath. Then I must coast by and through clouds, gasping, heaving into my lungs all available air... Two nights ago, with a suddenness that surprised me, I did let go of many things, and I immediately rose into the unresisting air. I floated, breathing easily, for hours, either tumbling slowly or swimming with broad strokes. But mostly I let the air carry my unresisting self as it willed. I even dozed, so gentle was this experience, until the sharp light of dawn returned me to my other life. Had I experienced in this astonishing event those last human moments before we are transformed in the twinkling of an eye into higher creatures? I cannot say, and do not, in this moment, want to learn. I am once again holding many things tightly in my grip.