Yin and Yang-2022-11-14

Yin and Yang (2022-11-14)
 
Wins are glorious, losses hard to bear.
The ego waxes—or the ego wanes.
Pride and courage cede to shame and fear.
When self is lost, what essence still remains?
 
The world we live in is a cruel place—
And so it was before we humans spread
Our special blight across the planet’s face—
And so it will be when we all are dead.
 
And yet, for every cruelty, we still can find
In humans, like in other beings, this—
The presence, often quiet, of an action kind—
And so, for every bruise, a touch of bliss.
 
Can “light” be known, without its counter, “dark”?
So kindness and its opposite are twinned,
And every color in the rainbow’s arc
Has tinged the ones who’re graced—and those who’ve sinned.
 
So yang and yin are nestled, each in each—
And good and evil too are born as twins.
And this we learn—and try in turn to teach—
The one who loses beats the one who wins—
 
For loss can give us depth of mind and heart,
And winning lead to hubris, which, in turn,
Can cloud the eye and dull the hearer’s art.
The plant that eats the sun will also burn.
 
In troubled times, it might become the norm
To seek a magic potion, spell or charm.
And yet, beneath the roiling of the storm,
There flows the ocean deep—with all its calm.
 
2022 November 14, Mon.
Brooklyn, New York