I took a wistful reverie To heal from the cataclysm Our confluence had brought. Yet in my trance The muses stabbed me With shards of moments. And I bled tears, When my torment was complete, The tears dried. And the shards froze, Into perfect crystal souvenirs In my heart. Poem previously published at: https://allpoetry.com/poem/15641776-The-Souvenirs-You-Left-by-AbhijitChatterjee
Mosaic of the exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac from the Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna , dating to the sixth century AD Many classical Christian religious imageries tend to depict Jesus Christ as the ‘good shepherd’. As per John 10:1-21 , one of the duties of the good shepherd is to lay down his life for his flock ( John 10:11 ). But, more implicitly the passages from John 10:1-21 denotes the absolute ownership the shepherd has over his flock. The shepherd is the only route of salvation for the flock. It neutralizes the need for the free will of the flock (or in this case his followers). It degrades the status of the flock to mere automata, incapable of creating spontaneous thought and action born out of free will. Nowhere is this status more obvious than the episode of Exorcism of the Gerasene Demoniac. This episode is mentioned in three Gospels; Mark 5:1-20 , Matthew 8: 28-34 and Luke 8:26-39 . Since Marks’s account is the most expansive of three available a