All The Pain It Did Not Choose Comments

as i have before, neal, i like your dense, unique, and accessible descriptions of things universal- in this case the heart. for another look at it, you may like my poem the heart as tabernacle if you haven't seen it already. -glen

Yet again you wear the heart on the sleeve, powerful images as it is all unravels as we read along. Another great piece. Annette

I've often contemplated free-will and control. I think it was stirred by discovering that the mind creates a thought or an action before it arrives into your consciousness. I hope we are not the robotic products of an unseen entity which operates our being. I take it that this is the nub of your poem which is quite magnificent. Some of your phrases are quite startling such as the weave of seasons and glaciered oblivion. Oddly enough the latter reminded me of a novel I read in French about mountaineering in the Dru mountains of Eastern France. The climbers came across the body of a young climber embedded in a glacier. Perfectly preserved, he had been moving down for more than twenty years. I never forgot that image and your phrase brought it back to mind. It's a very fine poem and joins my favourites.