As I start continue some changes in my life this poem reflects how I believe many of us have felt at times over the past 15 months. In my case it has been the usual Festina lente (make haste slowly) as opposed to “Big Bang”.
At the mid-point of the path through life, I found Myself lost in a wood so dark, the way Ahead was blotted out. The keening sound I still make shows how hard it is to say How harsh and bitter that place felt to me– Merely to think of it renews the fear– So bad that death by only a degree Could possibly be worse. As you shall hear, It led to good things too, eventually, But there and then I saw no sign of those, And can't say even now how I had come To be there, stunned and following my nose Away from the straight path.
From Clive James’ translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy.
The Incisal Edge 