Poetry | Yin and Yang Revisited
Yin and Yang Revisited
© 2018 Vernon Miles Kerr
I thought it might be time to revisit my 2014 poem, “Yin and Yang,” given the ensuing four years of world and personal events. The poem, rather “dashed-off” in a flash of inspiration and never really forged and honed, as it should have been, still conveys its intent to my own eyes but I can see how it could be more clear to the eyes of others. It could also use more metaphorical examples to prove its point: which I will leave to the reader to decipher. Here is the poem, as originally posted, followed by its 2018 rebirth as “Yin and Yang Revisited”.
Yin and Yang
© 2014 Vernon Miles Kerr
As do the black and white
Of the old Asian dichotomy,
The antipodes of Human Nature
Revolve in nauseating monotony:
Sumos exchanging brooding stares before the lunge.
The meth-addicted darkness
Rolls its empty sockets at the creative surge of the symphony;
The holocausts sidle up to the the martyrs;
An alleyway’s sodden sour garbage
Rubs against the flash of insight from a Dickinson poem;
The black tear of mourning
swirls against the white tear of joy.
Not that white could ever subsume black,
Or that both meld into dishwater gray…
But would that the black become ever grayer
And the white stay white.
Yin and Yang Revisited
© 2018 Vernon Miles Kerr
As do the Yin and Yang,
The black and white
Of that ancient Asian dichotomy,
The antipodes of Human Nature
Revolve in nauseating monotony:
Sumos exchanging brooding glares before the lunge.
The meth-addicted darkness
Rolls its empty sockets at the creative surge of a symphony;
The holocausts sidle up to a mother’s tender touch;
An alleyway’s sodden sour garbage
Rubs against the flash of insight from a Dickinson poem;
A bombed-out Syrian city’s collapse
Echoes through a tranquil Kyoto temple-garden;
The black tear of mourning
swirls against the white tear of joy.
Not that white could ever subsume black,
Or that both meld into dishwater gray…
Or that humanity could become pure light…
But would that the black become ever grayer
And the white stay white.