Poem Response: 10/28

Negation is eliminating something to focus on something else. It is a sort of meditation where we eliminate things to extend our possibilities. We alight something new out of the void. I have often felt this in spiritual moments. When I still identified as a Christian, I would oftentimes take great joy in praying or participating in adoration. The room would be empty, words lacking, with only a light to fill the room. In this emptiness, I felt the most whole. I focused on the interior and eliminated-for the time being-the exterior: the sounds constantly distracting from the important. I focused on what was important, myself. I would think of what needed to be improved. At the time of my first adoration, I prayed about my alcoholic father and narcissistic, abusive aunt. I focused on how they hurt me and how I no longer wanted to hurt. I felt a sense of tranquility by indulging in my pain and felt like I came to a general consensus within myself- something needed to be fixed and it could be done by analyzing each and every hurtful experience. I thought about how I could grow as a person; how I could help others even more. The room was empty, soundless, but my mind was loud and full. As a non-believer, I reflect on those times and realized that what was gained was spiritual, but, not in the holy sense. It was a sort of spirituality of delving into my innermost thoughts, gaining more possibilities, by eliminating the distracting. When I read "Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour", I could empathize with the situation for the very same reason. We both gained a spiritual sense through negation. We both encountered something beautiful by alighting endless possibilities and by honing in on the important.