There is a glass into which none must peer,
a well whose water none can taste,
a forbidden room, a tower, a cut that none can cut,
a wound once made that bleeds forever.
Here I am, harking back to a forgotten era. A generation ago, there was Robert Bly talking about the mythics of manhood. A lot of water has poured under that bridge; not all of it unpolluted.
But there was a notion around then that identified, perhaps for all expressions of man- and womanhood, how we are led to discover the world and ourselves through prohibition. Fairy-tale and fable embody much of it. A child is given much but also forbidden to look, venture, act in one important way. Curiosity is the route to terrible consequence. Often, it is an awakening, passing a point of no return, a loss of innocence.
So, we are betrayed, we betray ourselves, and through that betrayal cast out. We are so deeply wounded there can be no prospect of healing.
a well whose water none can taste,
a forbidden room, a tower, a cut that none can cut,
a wound once made that bleeds forever.
© BH, 2026
Here I am, harking back to a forgotten era. A generation ago, there was Robert Bly talking about the mythics of manhood. A lot of water has poured under that bridge; not all of it unpolluted.
But there was a notion around then that identified, perhaps for all expressions of man- and womanhood, how we are led to discover the world and ourselves through prohibition. Fairy-tale and fable embody much of it. A child is given much but also forbidden to look, venture, act in one important way. Curiosity is the route to terrible consequence. Often, it is an awakening, passing a point of no return, a loss of innocence.
So, we are betrayed, we betray ourselves, and through that betrayal cast out. We are so deeply wounded there can be no prospect of healing.
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