Sitting with my back supported by a cold, wet wall, I expected it to feel coarse, but my palms slipped along its surface and discovered only damp, worn edges.

I closed my eyes in trying to adjust to the failing light.

If I could figure out where I am, I could understand how I ended up here.

From somewhere above came a wan light, creating a faint halo in the gloom.

I sensed a deep pit like a well in a nomad castle, an oubliette of the sad tales where offenders and undesirables were thrown and forgotten. A summary prison"an inexorable terminus and destiny for anonymous and revolutionary alike.

What was my crime?

I tried to remember, but failed.

The external gloom matched the internal - the darkness deep inside was all the more frightening because I could not look inside and discover my identity.
I rose slowly; afraid I would feel pain from wounds of the flesh - dislocated limbs or broken ribs. Amazingly, everything was in place and undamaged. I felt no pain, hunger, or thirst. My drama did not include anything physical.
While stepping with care, I moved to the right while keeping my hand in constant contact with the wall. The floor, though wet, was clean. My outstretched arm encountered nothing but a flat stone.
Nothing seemed real.

Am I real?

With my back to the wall, I stretched my hands into space. After gathering courage, I took a cautious step, then another. After ten steps, my questing fingers encountered a wall. My eyes adapted to the faint light and I could see the extent of my confine.

Walking in circles was pointless in this square cell, so I sat down.

* * * * *

There was something strange about this room...a medieval castle's dungeon chamber should not be so clean. Self-awareness kindled in me like a campfire. I was fully dressed; I recognized the familiar coziness of my old, broken-in jeans. Jeans with a belt. A belt that should carry my cell phone's case. The case was there, but it was empty. Patting pockets, I discovered other deficiencies, my pockets were empty. Everything that might link me to life was missing. And yet I recognized pants, sweater, shoes and belt. I felt the elastic captivity of panties and the binding embrace of my brassiere. If this was hallucination, it was detailed enough to include the weight of eyeglasses on my nose.

In a leap of faith, felt my confinement was intentional and happened for a reason.

Should I see God's guidance in any and every gesture?

Every event is a link between past and future, a smooth hook of yesterday's yarn into today's fabric stitched into tomorrow. Elegantly passing through this moment, the present instant hanging like a crystal, transparent drop of cold dew. My reflection was distorted in the strange shape of the liquid lens, acting as a filter of introspection.

My presence must be meaningful, even if I could not comprehend it while sitting in the evolving dark.

Was I a monk assigned the pious reflection of solitude?

To reflect on what? Any holy or divine breakthrough would split a second like an atom, converting potential energy into kinetic, producing a light revealing all.

In view of my lost paralysis - as an apparent prisoner in a pit of lost time, what purpose did my thoughts hold? If I thought of veiled monks in meditation, was it a hint I should follow suit? What else could I do while trapped in this mystery?

Eyes open or closed? Standing or sitting? Thinking of what? The worthless things missing from my pockets or the essence of divinity and my sense of life? If I had the cell phone, the display could make light. Would it matter? The darkness of my soul would absorb that light. All the light in the world would be useless if my soul was in shadow.

All the things I miss are physical and unrelated to the inner me. No identification will answer the question...who am I? Passport, driver's license and library card are fine silver chains connected to the world. Credit cards bind you to the bank, obligation and work. The driver's license links you to the car, road and state. And so on. Valueless on a desert island, for example. At the bottom of a shaft? Less than immaterial. Money? Irrelevant. Keys? See me smile. The only thing with value would be music. Could I put on headphones and listen to a song or two? A sonata. A cantata. A fugue. A madrigal.

My soul for a toccata.

And then? After a brief reprieve from the imperative?

Answers? Are they so important?

Would I sit as well if I did not care who I was and what I was doing? Maybe I was born here and this deep pit was always my home and the light above was, is and always will be incomprehensible.

With everything starting and ending in obscurity. Maybe no record of our thoughts or deeds will persist.

No. I refuse to accept it. What would life be?

We are Icarus butterflies, seeking light on our journey to perdition. We'd dissolve in a cataclysmic orgasm if we reached our ideals - they'd be too hot and too bright for us. Peace on earth, perpetual happiness, harmony with nature and, through it, the divine.

Once, I read on a forum how people struggled to beat boredom. And here I sat, alone at the bottom of a shaft, in the dark, with nothing but the clothes on my back and I was not bored.

What's more important: what is inside or outside? Which form of darkness bothers me more? If you could light your inner self, would that light be visible to others?

Light up your inner soul...where's the switch? Imagine a neophyte monk's manual...to turn on the interior light, flip the switch by the door. Which door? See page 101 of the hundred-page manual.

I concentrated as hard as I could and focused on the dark sphere in the center of my being. Fear's shadow ran through my thoughts.

The result of meditation and introspection might be shocking.

We'd be shaken and disgusted by a critical examination of the small details of our life.

Things done at certain times...maybe they were inevitable or true to the moment, but when reconsidered with cold logic - layered with regret. Daggers stabbing the heart. Regret can grow like yanked weeds that come back with renewed force each spring.

Could the hard, square edges of my life have been avoided and replaced with doses of bliss?

There's innocence in self-abandonment. I felt a state of semiconscious ecstasy wrapping around me like a sweet cloak. Seductive, like a lover wrapping his arms around my waist"nibbling my ear and whispering.

"Stay. Don't leave" -His warm body pressed against my back; his heart beat like a distant echo.

"Does he really want me to stay?"

In staying, would I serve an animal's whim or sate a deep, true thirst for my being?

Did I want to know the answer?

If we were standing before a door that hid the cruel realities of ultimate truth"a door that said "Once through you'll find the truth about God." Would we reach for the knob or draw back? What other fundamental questions might we ask?
Are we alone in the cosmos?

If this pit was my only universe, would I find the loneliness and uncertainty of my life bearable? I am sensual, inquisitive and passionate; greedy to absorb the pleasures of the world like a starving baby attached to the maternal breast. An innocent, abandoned baby in the dark...suspended in time with a cluster of thoughts only a germ in my mind.

Am I a soul cleansed of previous existence and ready for rebirth?
The wall of my imaginary prison palpitated in synchronicity with my heart. A mysterious force ranged in my life, interpreting it for better or worse like an unseen conductor waving an imaginary baton and reading invisible music.
I felt as if I was failing this strange test, but I needed to know, so I opened my eyes.

On the wall, written in white light, was a single word.

Believe

I walked to the wall and touched the word. The paint was fresh and stained my fingers. A stepladder leaned against the wall.

Was it always there?

I was comfortable in my prison - as if I'd earned punishment and was meant to suffer, but I climbed. Tears filled my eyes. Little by little, the lip above the pit approached. I realized I was both prison guard and prisoner. Everything I ever needed was within.

One step remained; I felt victorious over fear. I'd been told over and over in action and in words: it was my place to be locked away from joy. I bore the stain of guilt and earned every penalty. I was meant to suffer and once free, would have to forever abandon my quiet, mysterious paradise.
The choice was mine.

The Icarus butterfly is an odd creature"sometimes one escapes the cruel grip of sin's gravity and reaches the sun.