STANDING AT THE DOOR

The key refinement is that the bodily “chemicals” are not the problem; they are markers of how much the imagined circumstance is already shaping THIS. And the freedom in the metaphor is not “never cross the threshold,” but becoming increasingly familiar with the difference between visiting a problem and living inside the world the story creates.

Story: THE DOORWAY

Verse 1

A moment ago we talked of music,
laughing while the afternoon
lay softly on the floorboards,
nothing asking to be done.

Then someone said, “How have you been?”
and thought went down the hall,
to tomorrow and decisions,
to the things not done at all.

At first they stood there quietly,
somewhere thought could go explore,
while the body still remembered
the room it had been in before.

Chorus

I can stand here at the doorway,
I can look into that room,
thought can visit what is coming
without making it come true.

Then the water reaches higher,
then the story covers all,
somewhere going to the problem
becomes the problem coming home.

I don’t have to stop the crossing,
I don’t have to guard the door,
just discover when I’m visiting
and when I’m swimming in it all.

Verse 2

There’s a form upon a desktop,
there’s a phone call still to make,
there’s a choice about tomorrow
and a road that I might take.

None of them were here a moment
while the music filled the air,
then a question brought an image
and the body met it there.

Stomach tightened, chest grew heavy,
thought said, “What if you choose wrong?”
and tomorrow, still tomorrow,
started playing now its song.

Chorus

I can stand here at the doorway,
I can look into that room,
thought can visit what is coming
without making it come true.

Then the water reaches higher,
then the story covers all,
somewhere going to the problem
becomes the problem coming home.

I don’t have to stop the crossing,
I don’t have to guard the door,
just discover when I’m visiting
and when I’m swimming in it all.

Verse 3

Ankles first and then the knees,
then waist and chest and suddenly sea,
no exact line beneath the water
where the thought became reality.

A picture of a conversation,
someone judging what I chose,
the body feels the future
though the future never showed.

Something absent grows a heartbeat,
something distant tightens breath,
not because tomorrow’s present,
but the picture’s happening here.

Bridge

And no one chose the chemicals,
no one ordered fear to start,
no controller pulled tomorrow
through the doorway of the heart.

So don’t make this one more duty:

Catch it early!
Stay outside!

Sometimes waves will simply take us.
Sometimes we won’t see the tide.

Maybe recognition happens
when the water’s at the shoe.
Maybe when we’re fully swimming.
Maybe hours after too.

Nothing failed because the doorway
wasn’t noticed on the way.
Seeing later still reveals
how thought turned distant things to today.

Verse 4

And life still needs decisions,
still needs calendars and plans,
we must visit next September,
remember where the promise stands.

Thinking forward isn’t failure.
Memory isn’t leaving THIS.
A map can show tomorrow
without tomorrow being lived.

Maybe ease won’t come beside us
when the difficult call begins.
Maybe hands are slightly shaking.
Maybe there are chemicals within.

Still the call can just be one call,
not the proof I cannot cope,
not my history and future
wrapped around a single note.

Chorus

I can stand here at the doorway,
I can look into that room,
thought can visit what is coming
without making it come true.

Then the water reaches higher,
then the story covers all,
somewhere going to the problem
becomes the problem coming home.

No need to keep the water shallow,
no awakened state to hold,
just discover how a thought begins
and how it gathers what it knows.

Verse 5

There’s the sentence on the laptop:

Please complete this section here.

Thought says, “I don’t know the answer,”
and the old familiar fear.

Then:

I always fail at these things.
I can never work this out.

See the water moving higher,
feel the world begin to crowd.

But perhaps the actual problem
is much smaller than the sea:

“I don’t know this information.
I can ask them what they need.”

Three lines travel in an email.
No great peace arrives instead.
Resistance keeps on breathing,
but the whole world isn’t spread.

Final Chorus

Standing here beside the doorway,
sometimes looking, sometimes through,
sometimes thought goes out to trouble,
sometimes trouble seems to move

right inside the present moment
till there’s nothing else at all.
Then perhaps the room gets wider
when the movement can be known.

No pushing thoughts to distance,
no demand for perfect ease,
no pretending actual living
can be done without unease.

Just the curious little question
when the body starts to show:

Am I still going to this—
or has it started coming home?

Outro

A moment ago—
music.

Now—
tomorrow.

A thought went there.

The body followed.

Then somehow
tomorrow was everywhere.

No mistake.

No one to blame.

Just notice the tide.

Sometimes standing at the doorway.

Sometimes already inside.