Metanoia

Pain

         Pain

inexplicable drives my mind
in a direction not sought;
avoided as no map exists
to chart my progress or prevent

slips into lost landscapes where
I might trap myself; there I
might lose hope in barren woods
filled with dry leaves floating
before my eyes in death.

Realization opens my mind.
Pain is the path lighting my way,
a firefly dancing before my eyes,
drawing me across beds of coals
that exhibit radiant heat; only I

discover they have long ago cooled
and hardened into diamonds; sharply
defined treasures of the soul
now ready to be mined,

growth revealed.