[Camino Poem No. 15] Carnal Knowledge

This is the 15th of 42 posts about the poems that carried me along the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route in Aug-Sep 2016. 

Day 15 - I made it to Burgos! That is almost 300km from where I started, but still around 500km away from Santiago. 

I had been choosing to spend a lot of time alone. This was, unsurprisingly, lonely. But it also felt important. That evening, I sat for two hours by myself in a church, relaxing into peace, and sifting through questions about what I was doing with my life. 

For the past three years, I've been writing a PhD on empathy. I'm in the philosophy department, but have become somewhat allergic to *academic* modes of speaking and writing. I have been doing a lot of explorations of the practice of empathy, yet I'm not close to being a therapist, or professional mediator, or monk. 

So, what then? I kept remembering poems from the previous days. Maybe my work is just learning to stand still and be astonished? Maybe, after a time, I will stop trying to be something, and turn into what I am? 

And then a fellow pilgrim picked this (below) as my poem for the day. Apt. 

Carnal Knowledge - Rebecca Elson (1960-99)

Having picked the final datum

From the universe

And fixed it in its column,

Named the causes of infinity,

Performed the calculus

Of the imaginary i, it seems

The body aches

To come too,

To the light,

Transmit the grace of gravity,

Express in its own algebra

The symmetries of awe and fear,

The shudder up the spine,

The knowing passing like a cool wind

That leaves the nape hairs leaping.

On this day, I walked 20km from Atapuerca to Burgos.