I am disparate from who I was, but your eyes fail to perceive as outwardly I look the same. My voice murmurs and you hear the same voice, think I am the same person, but you don’t listen to my words. The actions I undertake are altered ones, less self-indulging, more forgiving, open to learning and to achieving wisdom, yet your eyes sweep over the familiar, conclude nothing’s transformed.

I hasten away, dust rising in my wake. I could stay, demand your open mind, but experience acknowledges pleas from the familiar frequently are shunned, ignored, swept aside.

We entertain no revision in those we know.

All that I have become would crumble with you.

So I trod upon this path, leading away, to unfamiliar landscapes with autumn leaves and chill air, a passage beckoning me to further growth, an awakened mind receiving new awareness, my heart channeling expansion, opening, like the purple morning glory at sun’s burst, but continuing through each hour, ever seeking even into the still of fragrant, transporting night.

end 9/24/2016

S. Darlington