A Real Human Being

Remember when you told me about that show you watched that predicted how long it would take cities to return to nature after a human apocalypse? The green would spread, eventually choking out the roads and the buildings and covering everything again. And, in not very much time at all, all that was created would be returned to the wilderness that it once was. Perhaps that is how love is, after all the hatred and anger and sadness, creeping in and slowly recovering, until things fade into green again.

Beautiful.

This:

Dust

It seems we’ve left skin
in each other’s lungs. I should have

looked under your bed skirt
for my wallet, but how

could credit cards compare
to the sneeze after we’ve parted?

Gone and still you make me
reach for a tissue—still my palms

turn circles in the red
breakwater of your heartbeat.

I want to tell you, I have nothing
but respect for your ribcage

now that we both know
it’s not big enough to hold us.



- Michael Meyerhofer

On the Advent of the Death of Osama Bin Laden

Osama bin Laden is dead. Apparently we found a way to kill him. Everyone on Facebook is celebrating- a collective sigh of relief, no doubt, for the death of one who caused the deaths of thousands. There can be no doubt that bin Laden posed a collective threat to Americans and Muslims alike. The formation and support of a radical branch of Islam that supports terrorism and martyrdom as part of the religion makes him what ol 'W' would refer to as an "evil doer." A cold-blooded murderer. The face that launched a thousand bombs. And yet, celebrating his death still seems extremely wrong to me.

I don't believe in the death penalty because I believe that there's always more to someone than an action, or a professed belief. As evil as he was, as Saddam was, there were still, most likely, good parts to them. Because that's what it means to be human. It means that there's a substantial amount of both light and dark. He was a father and he was someone's child, someone's brother. And regardless of his substantial crimes, he could not have been utterly full of hate all the time. No doubt he played games and laughed and did kind things for people he lived amongst.

If it seems like I am being too soft on such a murderous criminal, I am not. I just think the act of killing requires a black and white thinking that is the fundamental problem in our society today, and, I should mention, the very same problem that the man is himself guilty of. It is because he was able to see all Americans as evildoers that he was able to plan and carry out a plot to kill thousands of us. We know we are not all evildoers, but this continued focus on bin Laden = BAD America= GOOD is a lie. He was not all evil and we are not all good. The reason that he despised us in the first place is because he is a crazy person, but also because he saw America's hands in the Middle East these past thirty years, saw first hand the death and destruction we have caused, and hated us for it. Attributed it to our lack of God. The very things we hate in him, he hated in us first, until it becomes a projection upon a projection. The things we hate about Osama- his self-righteousness, his violence, his ruthlessness, his hatred of America- are the very things that he hated about us: our self-righteousness, our violence, our ruthlessness, our hatred of all things Islam. And who is right? NO ONE. Because when you hate people, you cease to see them as people and in that moment, you are ALWAYS wrong.

Killing him will be seen as a win. For Obama and for the "war on terror." And I hope it does protect people and prevent more death and destruction. I really hope it does. But it is not a celebration. It is a continuance of the destructive patterns of violence and hatred that perpetuate our country and our world today. Death for death, a life to pay for lives (which of course, it never can), killing to "stop" killing. I worry that it makes him a martyr to his followers; that there will be fallout for this action that will result in more death and more revenge and more "justice" and that more people will die, whether our own or theirs. I worry that, far from being the final chapter in a tragedy, that this is merely another plot development in an ever-deepening saga of despair. I truly hope, like Obama said in his speech, that it brings our divided country together, that it heals the thousands of Muslims who have suffered from bin Laden's hate, that it helps to bring closure to those who lost so much on that day in 2001, to those who have continued to die as a result of it ever since. I hope for these things, but my heart is heavy because I do not think it will really accomplish any of those things.

And so, rather than celebrate his death as a victory for our side, I view his passing with increasing solemnity. He could never have won this fight, but neither can we, as long as we continue down this path. Death is always a loss. May this be the last.

Clean Getaway

I made my place by the door.
I didn't know what I was waiting for.
Felt just like home.
Except no grass, no yard, no pictures hung.

I could see across to the park.
And there were friends, they were laughing hard.
They looked just like my own.
With no face, no name, no voice I'd know.

I finally made it.
I made a clean getaway.
I finally made it.
I made a clean getaway.

I met someone at the bar.
He had a great smile and a great heart.
He felt just like love.
Except no fear of losing, and it wasn't tough.

I finally made it.
I made a clean getaway.
I finally made it.
I made a clean getaway.
And I miss you,
I miss you every single day.

-Maria Taylor

Love

I haven't blogged in a while. Mostly that's because I reread everything I'd written in the past year and basically hated most if not all of it. And, because I've been busy. And because I make excuses. :)

However, I need to write today, so poor prose be damned- it's gotta go somewhere, might as well take flight into the deep void of the internet.

I went to church yesterday for the first time in five years- not a Mormon church, but a Unitarian church. I figure, any church that allows you to be an atheist and has accepted homosexuals for ages probably can't be half bad. The pastor (or minister or whatever they call him) read a passage from Ursula Goodenough who is an atheist (religious naturalist) who talked about how she wishes, during times of trouble, that she could believe in a god to call on; yet because she cannot, she must rely on human love in all its fragility and imperfection, to help heal.

I think about love a lot. What it means to love someone, what constitutes "love" verses affection, whether there really is a thin line between love and hate, how to love someone and not be in love with them, how love manifests itself through actions, whether love can "die." So many questions about this emotion/feeling, so few direct answers. No one seems to have concordant answers to the questions.

Is it love if you don't say it?
Is it love if you betray?
Is it love if you can't forgive?
Is it love if sometimes you feel it more than others?
Is it love if it ends?
Is it love if you choose yourself over someone else?

I don't have answers either. However, having suffered my fair share of life's slings and arrows, I do believe, at the end of the day, that love is an ever-fixed mark that looks on tempests and is not shaken. I believe love comes with a price, like everything. It can be a heavy price, but at the end of the day, even while paying that price, I will say that I am not sorry to pay it. And so, come what may, I am thankful to have had the opportunity to have loved.

Then jet the blue tent topple, stars rain down,
and god or void appall us till we drown
   in our own tears: today we start
to pay the piper with each breath, yet love
knows not of death nor calculus above
   the simple sum of heart plus heart.

- Sylvia Plath

Why?

I've been thinking lately about the rarity of the question "why." My friend and I were talking about religion the other day and he mentioned the frustration that, as an atheist, he is supposed to be respectful of people's beliefs, that it is considered bad manners to question someone religious as to why they believe the things that they do. This idea has extended somewhat in my thinking- why don't we ask why more often? Why seems like a question that invites vulnerability. If I ask you why you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, or why you don't return my phone calls, or why you believe that Muslims shouldn't be allowed to build a community center in downtown NYC, the likelihood is that I am asking because I disagree with your position or your actions.

I get the whole "vulnerability" aspect of questioning someone's actions or opinions, but it seems like we could get to know one another so much better if we asked why about seemingly unimportant things too- why do you like that type of coffee? Why did you buy this truck? Why do you think you like Brandy Carlile? And then the importance of giving thoughtful answers. Communication focusing on actual connections- "why" indicates an interest in one's inner workings. "Why" means that I care about you enough to be interested in your reasoning, your processes, your background, your history. Being brave enough to answer "why's" means that you are able to act with integrity- to question your own thoughts and beliefs and see if there's something solid underneath the actions and the impulses and the emotions.