**Contradicting Balance**

[Dimitri Kova]

Constant doubt is balanced by constant hope.
Though those doubts are rough;
Heavy they are on my back.
Self-esteem is crushed;
Image is smothered.
Will to keep going is diminishing.
I tread the Sahara of sorrow,
Pain and hopelessness.
The Sun's radient ego shines hard on my head,
Traveling to my inner workings.
Its radiation is eating me alive.
No!
I must keep moving,
I've gotten this far,
I'm not dying today.

What is that in the distance?
A mirage?
No....
The oasis of hope is in clear view.
I sip the water of Joy;
Bathe in the shade of Relief.
As soon as it was noticed-
It began to disappear-
Now I must tread further,
I must find the real Hope Oasis.

False hope is a great substitute for the real thing.
Wanting to stay in that false hope is useless;
A waste of time and energy.
Don't seelt unless you have to.
If hope is night,
You are the Sun-
You will never catch up.
Become the opposite;
A strange attraction will be made;
And hopefully,
It will be within grasp.

************************************

Admin note:
Nominated for Poem of the Week on 9/14/06

[Debbie]

Dimitri Kova..I felt the discouragment in this poem...but we must not give in..keep climbing crawling swimming what ever..we musn't quit

[foreverflame]

My kind of write.

It was as much poetry as it was wisdom.

[heinzs]

[Tony Fiona]

yin and yang
hard and soft
light and dark
balance

[snorple]

It's our culture that demands keeping going on, no matter what the problems are. Other cultures can draw a line under it though, like the Japanese, once they reach the stage of losing so much face that going on inpinges on their honour they then resort to the maxim of let's cut it short. And they cut it short literally, with a knife and to underscore that it is their choice to stop going on the knife is used in the must painful way by cutting their guts out slowly, not once but idealy twice. This is their idea of honour, this is their idea of dying nobly or of going out with all guns blazing.
Personaly I think that it is hourable to bear the unendurable, but also have a grudging respect of someone who can die with honour, I say grudgingly because killing onself still is abhorrent to westerners genrally and to myself personaly.