we form shells

hard ones, thin ones, brittle ones, strong, they deform and confine us, yet contain us, shape our predictable contours and roll us through our days and nights, days and nights, days and nights unto the grave, wide asleep.

 but Life, wow -- she's a nut-cracker, eh?

 life abhors potentials unfulfilled, unmet or otherwise unexpressed in her wild dance of exuberance, her "fierce grace" (to use Ram Dass's term, which can't be improved upon ;-). She will poke and prod and worry and in the end jackhammer us until we spill our sweetmeats steaming and clotted onto her bloodied floor.

 and then we are free ;-)