The Death Inside.

The Death Inside.

 

Loneliness creeps in upon one

O how silently it does

Striking swiftly

Sapping the will to live

Barring company

Blotting the mind

So blows the Chill Wind

Loneliness

 

Only the chirping of birds

The sound of distant voices

Rushing winds

Break the gloom of day

Ease the depression

Alone in a crowd

So blows the Chill Wind

Loneliness

 

It pains one, this emptiness

Such blowing in the wind

Dry as dust

Wearing steadily away

Eroding the mind

Endless the night

So blows the Chill Wind

Alone

Exeter Winter 1978.

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Reading this again, it gives the impression that I was lonely and unhappy at Exeter. That was certainly not the case; I made a number of good friends, many of whom I keep in touch with today. But it is not that kind of loneliness, but rather an existential experience of alienation. Around this time, I came across Ursula Le Guin's Farthest Shore, and the Unmaker in it draws the meaning from people's lives, so that there is nothing left - "There is a hole in the world, and the light is running out."  That sums up very well some of my experiences of that time, which came back later, and still occur today on occasion.