What Is It That I Fear, We Fear So Much?

What is it that I fear so much,
We fear so much
In this life and what’s next?
That makes me lose my reason, my recall, my trust, my breadth of vision, my capability
.
Is it loss of all I cherish
My loves, my credit-worthiness
Leaving me bereft
Useless, purposeless, worthless, paralysed, alone
.
Is it causing others pain
Filling me with guilt and shame?
Awaiting some kind of painful retribution
Administered from on high
For doing something wrong
That I shouldn’t have done
Or not doing something right
That I should have done
Or not knowing
What I should have known?
Is it some great missing out
Through making the wrong decision
Making me regret what I decided
Even though it seemed right at the time
.
What’s love got to do with it?
What’s money got to do with it?
Where did this fear come from?
.
Some might say my free will
Some might say my ego
Some might say my greed
Some might say my human nature
Growing like a weed
To spoil my garden of delight
Insinuating
Like that snake-in-the-grass
With forked tongue and venomous bite
That’s so hard to see, pin down or grasp
Worming its way from then to now
In my life,
Our life
Saying we should know
What we can’t know in advance
Before it’s too late to change course
.
But in reality none of us can make free choices
Independent from our circumstances
So none of us can be free from cultural influence
Stretching from past through current to not yet
Calling us back and forth in endless iterations of the same old stories
Concocted from hindsight
Dividing
Heaven from Hell
Good from Evil
Light from Darkness
Something from Nothing
Perfection from Imperfection
Success from Failure
Blamelessness from Blameworthiness
Endlessly confusing association with causation
Outcome with mechanism
Handed down through generations
By word of mouth
And deed
Into fear’s unwitting ears
Regardless of contextual influence
.
How I long to be free from it
To cast this fear to some far place
Out of sight and mind…
And yet, my dream says
I must handle it
With tender, loving care
Forgiving its trespasses
Regardless of the discomfort
For only then will it feel at home
And coil up on my hearth
Ever watchful
Never more than fleetingly
Wishing me or others ill
But quite the contrary
Despite its alarming appearance
.
No longer a fear to be feared
When it slithers out of place
But guardian of my soul
Guardian of all our souls
To be revered
Not cast aside or bottled up
Somewhere it can’t reside