The Lantern in Haunted Places
A Meditation on the Inner Voice that Carries Beauty Through Desolation
original photo by B. Littleton, Raven Totem, Chesterman’s Beach, Tofino, B. C. Canada
“. . . Somewhere in every heart there is a discerning voice. This voice distrusts the status quo. It sounds out the falsity in things and encourages dissent from the images things tend to assume. It underlines the secret crevices where the surface has become strained. It advises distance and opens up a new perspective through which the concealed meaning of a situation might emerge. The inner voice makes any complicity uneasy. Its intention is to keep the heart clean and clear. This voice is an inner whisper not obvious or known to others outside. It receives little attention and is not usually highlighted among a person’s qualities. Yet so much depends on this small voice. The truth of its whisper marks the line between honor and egoism, kindness and chaos. In extreme situations, which have been emptied of all shelter and tenderness, this small voice whispers from somewhere beyond and encourages the heart to hold out for dignity, respect, beauty and love. This inner whisper brings forgotten nobility into an arena where illness, desolation, abandonment, violence has saturated each moment, every cell. This faithful voice can illuminate the dark lands of despair. It becomes both the sign and presence of a transcendence that no force or horror can extinguish. Each day in the world, against all the odds, this still, small voice continues to echo the beauty of the human being. In haunted places this voice carries the light of beauty like a magical lantern to transform desolation, to remind us that regardless of what may be wrenched from us, there is a dignity and hope that we do not have to lose. This voice brings us directly into contact with the inalienable presence of beauty in the soul.” excerpt from an essay, B. Littleton.
written by Bren Littleton
original photo by B. Littleton, Raven Totem, Chesterman’s Beach, Tofino, B. C. Canada