Karma, Light and Shadow
What he suppresses, she expresses
Where his love fell short, a broken heart taught
Where he abandoned, love became a thing to be earned
Where he tried to mould the clay, she had to make her own way
Where his shadows became too much, light within she had to search
The first man a girl gets acquainted with is a father. He opens her worldview and somehow becomes a measure of her own value. The dynamic sets the tone for what she learns about men, love, achievement and about worth. He is her world and she does everything in her capacity to make sure her world looks bright for her father becomes her light.
A first born is a father’s delight. She is the softness in his harsh world, the smile after his hard days and the very reason for his daily toil. He wants to give her everything. He wants to teach her everything he learnt about the ways of the world. Somehow she becomes a project that he needs to master and get it right. His inner boy learnt quick how the world works. In his enthusiasm to shield her from rain, he became her cloud.
He was her light and so she let the rain pour,
And allow the water to mould her for him to truly hold her.
But life has its ways to lead you astray
To teach you that you are not a piece of clay,
That the only Potter is the one the clay knew,
That He is the Father whose true child are you,
That the world is a stage and we are actors in a role,
That parents are but soil who must let their child toil.
That yes your children are not your children,
That they come through you and never from you
The elder daughter holds a mirror to her father’s soul. She becomes a lesson in softness, a way back home for him. The world might have taught him lessons in harshness, but she teaches him that there is beauty in forgiveness. The world might have taught him that it is all zero-sum, but she teaches him that you can have a soft heart and still win. She brings out his softness that he buried so deep within himself that he turned out to be superhero. A superhero yes, but an ironman- One who never breaks, a support that almost feels like rock until the day he does become a rock. For he carried it together for so long that he forgot he mattered all along. No he was not wrong and this was all he knew and all he held true.
But do we need to carry these patterns forward is a question that demands attention. For when we rise in consciousness, we can dream of a world where emotions are not weakness and there is abundance for everyone.
For we can hold light in the very same darkness that caused him to shun his own bright.
To tell him he was always enough and that he need not act it tough,
For my father is not my sorrow and he still is my superhero,
For a superhero is not the one who never breaks,
But a one who embraces his own ache
Love and light
Yasmin Gill
