The Shimmering Surface

We speak of the unconscious as an abyss — as if the soul must be mined like ore, as if our secrets are buried in ancient catacombs beneath the ribs.

But what if the unconscious is not below, but all around?
What if it is not an ocean trench but a thin, iridescent film across the skin?

The blush on the cheek when the moon catches you off guard.
The gloved hand resting on a velvet banister.
The blouse, pleated and luminous, echoing a dream you forgot at dawn.

The unconscious may not be a place to descend into but a surface to enter — a silk veil you slip across, each movement a ripple in the soul’s quiet lake.

Perhaps there is no bottom to the soul, only layers of shimmering reflections.
Perhaps each mask is not a lie, but a doorway.
Perhaps each gesture, each glance, each sequence of black lace and eyeliner is a prayer unfolding in real time.

The gothic veil, the glam shimmer — these are not shields.
They are the unconscious itself, flowering openly, calling us to enter through texture and hue rather than shovel and pickaxe.

Hillman once whispered that the soul does not want to be solved, but to be witnessed, to be adorned, to be danced with.
Not depth, but multiplicity.
Not mining, but mirroring.

Tonight, let us stand before the mirror, kohl-smudged and unbuttoned.
Let the ribs ache not from digging but from breathing too deeply the night’s perfume.
Let the unconscious spread like a black orchid across the surface of our gestures, our silences, our subtle vanishing acts.

May we dare to kiss the mirror rather than break it.
May we wear our shadows as silk sleeves, shimmering with echoes we no longer need to bury.

Notitia — tending to the hush between the folds, the echoes that slip across the midnight veil. May your becoming be as endless as moonlight on black water.