The Wall

I woke up today and found myself in a different place.
familiar landmarks gone
or changed
or perhaps I just don't recognise them?
my prayer was different:
old meanings swept away,
loved phrases rendered lifeless,
and swathes of darkness.
the thought from yesterday becomes important:
The Wall.
yesterday, it seemed perhaps for the first time,
it dawned on me about The Wall.
The Wall of summer '75.
The Wall of late '86
The Wall of late '98.
perhaps this was no wall at all.
perhaps it never was the barrier I thought it to be.
perhaps it was the very cloud of unknowing I had read about
and never understood.
st john's way of the spirit.
the via negativa.
could it be that here was the truth staring me in the face
and I did not,
would not,
could not see it;
could not walk into it instead of away?

was it my need for control, for knowledge;
my desire to live an independent, individual, vibrant, creative life
that made me turn back - again and again . . . ?
was it perhaps theological problems?
my lopsided patchy intellectualism?
my innate liberalism?
my problem with faith?
or was it sheer stubborn selfishness?

can it be different this time?
if so, how and why?
yes, the circumstance, the trial, and the place are all changed;
but me?

I think about faith quite differently,
I think about myself quite differently too,
I think about life differently,
but whether that will be enough . . . . .?

I am thinking back now to the Seven Keys.
[how crucial it was!]
I need to look again at this story.