In a few relatively straightforward writings I have noticed
that we are invited over and over again to take note of
the following idea: Solitude is exceptionally beautiful
. Here, the concept of solitude has a certain amount of
ambiguity. In a person's inner heart where the spirit resides,
probably there is already no way of making it any more precise.
It likely refers to the state of being alone---naturally
it matters not whether this is a physical or a spiritual
aloneness. An animal, or a tree, all can be alone. Solitude
is a result of being difficult to classify. Is it beautiful?
If it truly is, then people have no need of frantically
avoiding it. At the very least, it is not as beautiful as
people fantasize. If it has some modicum of beauty, then
it is only a kind of desolate beauty.
For a person to be in that kind of situation he must have
been coerced. The reason why contemporary man is so solitary
and alone is because he has a "spirit" which continually
grows. If you want to eliminate that fear of solitude, you
have to cut off its roots. But this is futile; so long as
man goes on living, the fear will grow. To feign ordinariness
may have some appeal, but if you want to cast a man back
into the ordinary, you will inevitably encounter strong
resistance from him.
To linger in solitude is full of poetry, but extremely
few people have noticed the pain involved. Solitude is usually
a matter of the connection between one mind and another
being blocked. From the time human beings are born they
are faced with innumerable secrets. In the case of each
and every person, those secrets do not diminish with time,
they increase many times over. They come from everywhere,
and they come from people themselves. Therefore, the awkwardness
of being mocked and confused will forever accompany them.
For that reason everyone consciously and unconsciously struggles
for release---an inexpressible terror leads them to lose
their composure.
In my eyes, solitude is frightful, but to throw away one's
self respect is even more frightful. How can one maintain
the latter, yet preserve the freshness of his mind? Perhaps
one really cannot "have one's cake and eat it too." Perhaps
it is a puzzle which awaits a solution. In the course of
the long, long wait, is there anything that can substitute
for inner thoughts and personal dialogues? I have discovered
that the soul is capable of dividing itself into parts.
The different parts can even engage in dialogues. But it
goes without saying, in order to hear this dialogue an unusual
amount of tranquility is required.
Just as a seed which is cast down must find a piece of
naked soil, I follow my direct impulses to flee toward the
earth. It produces everything, can respond to everything,
and fulfils everything. Because I have been starved and
abused for so long, I chose September, the season when the
crops have grown to maturity, to make my long flight back
to the wilderness. Then the fields are full of produce.
Because of the plenitude and abundance, the myriad living
things exude an irrepressible joy. Everything is pleasing
and good. The deep green plants, the flowers which have
not yet withered, the black soil and yellow sand---all are
fresh and vivid. Here, in the midst of all this, the anxieties
which invade and wound are reduced as never before. All
that arises in my heart are reliance and grace.
This is a world in which one mutters to oneself; it is
the most generous world that I have yet found. Here the
spirit is least disturbed. Being here I finally realized
that solitude isn't only the loss of the facility to communicate.
Even more formidably, in face of repeated intrusions, it
is the loss of the right to speak to oneself. This is the
final right.
It is for this small gain that I have been willing to
travel thousands of miles, and have even, for a time, become
"able to endure." I calm myself down and settle in for a
stay. Only then do I come face to face with my own good
fortune. I am simply overjoyed. In this place I have come
to understand a matter very close to hand: In contrast to
us, the mountain ranges and the earth are a background which
has not changed for millions of years. It is as though we
have been set before a kind of perpetuity. Leaning against
it we can, as much as we dare, enter a deep somniloquy.
Then, with the dawn, we will always be awakened by that
persistent, far-off call.
Where can any place comparable to this be found in the
realm of the quotidian? This is the center of the world.
It is the place psychologically closest to the maternal.
Here you can tell all you want of the wanderings of yesteryear.
As the years and months of misery have already passed away,
a man finally welcomes his parents. You did not weep for
you have become so used to hiding your tears. Ultimately,
your sensibilities have become so acute that with a light,
quick glance you can see right through the common. The perpetual
and the temporary, the empty and the real, all appear clear
and distinct. You have discovered that it is not as difficult
as you had imagined to seek those people and things which
are like you. All that are straightforward, calm, and pure
are the same as you. It is most probably that not all of
these will speak the same language, nor necessarily communicate
with a voice. Those which are of the same kind are all children
who Mother Earth cares for in the same manner. They drink
at the same breast and give off the same milky smell.
In the long, warm tranquil nights you are bathed in the
fragrance of the wilds. Reminiscing and musing freely, you
dispel your loneliness. Your breast full of tender emotions
also finds a place to reside. I become yielding and understanding.
I attempt to forgive those things which in the past I have
never forgiven, and I also seek to investigate things at
the very root of my nature. The sounds of the night are
endlessly complex and profuse. I contemplate in their midst.
They even inspire me to once again seek out the mystery
of words. With my intonation and voice I tried to imitate
the things of the wilderness, trying to convey their inner
expression. The small birds chirp; "Jiu, Jiu. à±" 1 Not only
does the word very closely imitate their song, the character
'autumn' (qiu à±) leads us to think of autumn; the autumn
sky, and autumn wilds. From the "mouth ¿Ú" radical in the
character we think of autumn's mouth and vocal chords---these
are brought together. There is also the soughing of the
wind in the fields, the echoes and the light that wanders
about in the depths of night. How should these things be
formed into words and entered into the understanding of
modern people? This is not just an experience replete with
interest, it almost comes closer to a kind of meaning and
an objective. In the silent nightscape I find the meaning
of sounds and their secret code. It is almost like holding
the throbbing pulse of the myriad things in my hand.
A feeling of mutual support and complicity expels the
mind's unease. I exist and live together with all things
in the wilderness, together experiencing and accepting.
By the end of the night I have heard more than once the
anguished cries of the myriad creatures in that instant
when they give birth. I thus have received the feelings
spun from the confluence of desolation and excitement, and
have let them steel me.
It is well that these things do not only remain in the
sensations. After having transcended the boundary of subjectivity,
they can truly and genuinely be touched.
