I fell from such dizzying heights Like icarus in a widening gyre Tumbling down in an elegant arc And spiraling away from all that is safe and certain. It’s not my fault I didn’t jump Only, the footing of my perch Crumbled under my feet And though I did not reach out to steady myself Or try to stop my precipitous downward rush And though I did embrace gravity’s dangerous curve And I did spread my wings on the wind like and eagle gliding down from the skies, or a skier sliding down along a vertiginous powdery slope – It wasn’t my fault It wasn’t my fault that the crumbling perch fell apart underneath my feet I fell… Down, down, the spiral deepens and tightens as my inhibitions fly off like sparks on a giant, screeching grinding stone. Dizzy, dizzy, I now become disoriented as direction and vertical aspect flee away. Am I falling or am I flying? How can I not know? Or am I floating now? Slowly, inexorably down to the fiery red glow of hell now shining softly below me? Am I now caught up in the moral pull of that satanic light that takes all the fallen? I fell… But no! That fast approaching light is not luciferan after all. It is the dawn! That rises as I crash upward through the clean surface of the water and behold for the first time the sprawling rays of that burning orb in all it’s heady crimson glory and I fly, fly (not fall) and soar out above the depths that formerly drowned my imagination and encased my body in a slow motion pantomime of living. And lo! As I shatter the mirror surface of the water and I feel the rush of wind around my face, I open my mouth wide and I fill my lungs with air and for the first time I can breathe!