- - -

eye contact: expansive moment, something enlarges
between one and two a binding meeting of lovers
the space between shrinking
there is love in unification

and there is love also in diversion-
a tearing that bears seeds
a turning inward into the self- and finding there the other

we will learn to love by finding each other in and around ourselves:
this will be a movement, dancing, ephemeral
like the light reflecting off of your eyes, aflame!

- - -

after having apologized, i set out to write something meaningful.

i believe that i-you-we-is-god.

i believe in i-you-we.

that didn't work.

after being made to feel uncomfortable, i set out to write something meaningful.

i can feel the mechanism at play,

the motion of ones, twos, and threes.

it still didn't work.

i can see that within me and without me are the same but different. they seem so different but they are really just the same. they are the same but they are distinct.

have you ever heard your own words spoken through another and back to you? the way a rumor spreads. the way knowledge spreads. the incemination of ideas through one another, through language speakers. or have you ever given advice to someone, the same advice they once gave you? now they have forgotten for the moment and need you to remind them. or perhaps it is the other way around. they are now reminding you of something that you once showed them.

the animals don't seem happy here... is there something i don't know?
is there something wrong with this place?

are we falling for some kind of trap?

- - -

friendship is the heart of love. love is interconnectedness and interrelatedness, which is why i want to agree with those who say god is love. for real, they are close.

god is motion. god is climax and erosion, tension and denouement.

many think of god as the builder. god can be more likened to the bricks and the qualities that the bricks have which keep the building standing. god is most like the relationship between the bricks and the mortar. we can know god always, without asking about the builder.

god is in the hallways while we so often ask, "what lies behind the doors?"

some say, "we are all meant to be gods." others say, "the universe is god." those who say these things are close and they are close to one another.

god is a reversal and an intermission.

ask not, "what happened at the beginning of the beginning?" instead admire the procession of beginnings. notice that the beginning is never the beginning once it is named. come to know and love pondering beginning after beginning after beginning.

ask not, "why?" but listen as the child asks, "why?" over and over again. listen to the endless whys like psalms singing that i-you-we-is-god.

god is not mysterious. god is mystery.

god is paradox. god is the present now.

god is not this or that. that there is this and that at once is god.

god is not just you or me. god is the fact that you and i are able to interact.

"what is god?" we ask ourselves this question because we want to know our purpose. we would like to place ourselves in a narrative and give ourselves reasons. purposes and reasons are very human. many ask, "what is the point of it all?" it reminds me of those who ask about the builder.

i-you-we-is-god.

- - -

the extreme-most of experience where one can find the limit is always changing, ever variable.

- - -

we have built ourselves around ourselves and inside of ourselves: constructs. and so have i. constructs are necessary to carry on. take this, for example: my body is something that i can move at will. that idea is a helpful construct most of the time. here is another construct that has been helpful for many: god is and god is good.

these are both especially concise constructs. other constructs are more difficult to name. they are ways of thinking, ways of being, and ways of interacting.

to achieve one's potential, one must overcome one's constructs. one must undercut oneself. life must overcome life. life must undercut itself. see: the current and the undertow. one must break ones back.

liberation is an exercise and a motion. it always turns in on itself and out against itself. it is terrifying and wonder filled. sometimes it is abrupt and sometimes it is a slow deterioration.

one must liberate oneself in order to liberate others. through others one can learn one's constructs. one's self and one's others are one's existence and one's universe. these things found find god: i-you-we-is-god.

a child runs down a hallway. at every bend of the hallway another stretch of hallway reveals itself to the child. rooms appear behind doorways just as the child walks through them. a labyrinth is created with many rooms and bends. it even has levels and staircases. a labyrinth is created as the child runs and bends and stops, exploring. at times the hallways lead back to places the child has been before.

when the child sings, they hear their voice reverberated back to them through the many hallways they have created. when the child cries out in loneliness they hear only their own cries echoed back towards them. the child dreams of other children, but they cannot find them. in vain they search for another child to play with. they search down hallway after hallway, and through door after door, finding nothing but themselves.

in vain they make their labyrinth larger and more complex with every passing moment, searching for another child, desperately hoping. if only they could share their labyrinth with someone else! but, they cannot. the labyrinth is their own and theirs alone. 

-----

a man sits withered and old on his front porch, rocking back and forth on a wicker chair, trying to decide. he wonders to himself what he has done with his life. who has he become? what being was he that was born, has lived, and will soon pass out of being? of what unique character were his actions and decisions? what had he created, that he and he alone could boast of? 

many options suit him, his work, his marriage, his children, and his church. he thinks of his guitar playing and his cooking. all these things, and many others, seem to him, at first, his own. however, this man is a very honest man. a very thoughtful man indeed. 

soon, he realizes that for each of these things he had thought to be his, he had been wrong. in fact, these things were not his own. in each case, he found not his own, but someone else's whose hand was truly at work. he realized over and over again that he was nothing more than the work of others.

in some cases he could recall some word of advice from a friend that had led to his choice. he found his father in much of what he had become. there were teachers he had known who altered the course of his life. when he looked back on his lovelier moments, the times when he had acted with grace, he saw only his wife in himself. he searched for himself and found only influence all throughout him. 

every day, he wondered, "what exactly have i done? who have i become?" every day he rocked on his chair and he wondered, searching for himself. every day, until he had none left, he found only others.

----

and the child and the man are one and many; the man a labyrinth of others and the child one of many.

we are building nests around ourselves, creating a home in sense. did we mean to become the types that would build the homes we've built? whether or not we love these homes never helped us answer this question. 

we find ourselves drawn to this or that, valuing it above the other choices. love or beauty sometimes made us choose. many fancy their choices necessary, and they rob themselves of the gift of choice. we were meant to choose and choose we shall, whether or not we'd like to and whether or not we like our choices. 

do you love the world around you? do you love yourself? what do you love? what is appalling to you? what disgusts you? what do you refuse to acknowledge? do not think quickly. rather let others show you the way. others will always show you the way to yourself. and within yourself you can find your way to others.

in this way we can see that the ways of the world are the ways of ourselves. and rather that the ways of ourselves are the ways of our world. it can be difficult to know whether we have built the nest or whether living in this nest has made us who we are. which came first is a wonderful question, wonder filled and endless. 

there are as many nests as there are nest builders. as many known universes as there are individuals in sense. and then each one came to know itself through the others. foolishly and gruesomely entwined, lavishly interwoven, many always becoming one and the one nest being irrevocably many. 

(repetition i am. recurring as always. repetition, to repeat oneself and to find oneself repeated in others, and others repeated in oneself. and to find oneself repeated in oneself- and to find others being known, thought of, as archetypes by one such as myself.) 

we have built a nest around ourselves without looking at it. we have always gazed, trying to see what lies beyond the nest we've built, trying to see the nest "it" built. only we knew the nest through the reflections in each others eyes and "it" is not a builder the way that we are builders. we've had a miscommunication. we saw but did not observe the nest. 

we were like children, knowing but not noticing the care of a mothers subtle hand. we were like the mother, knowing but not observing the blessing of a troublesome child. in both cases a revelation is had after the child leaves the home. and this is what we've tried to do. we've tried to leave the nest and see it from afar. we've found, with consternation, that we cannot leave the nest so we must instead try to see the home through each others eyes. 

the mother is the child and the child is the mother.

the babe knows only its mothers gaze. the babe knows best the air it breathes in the moment it breathes air for the first time, the moment it sees its mothers loving face, and then it promptly forgets. this too is when the mother most authentically knows love. the trouble is this: having forgotten about the air we breath, and having loved at our finest, how can we once again know birth after birth but before death?

i say: by finding "it" in the mechanism. by pursuing what is wonder filled and endless. but not perfection, nor eternity. rather motion and paradox. these will teach us birth and death, love and beauty, and many other, far more pertinent things.