The Morning Speaks for Itself


Dear Eugene,

"Well, the morning speaks for itself..."

The conclusion that concludes nothing came to me first thing in the morning, and now I am working  backward to trace my steps in dream(s).

(Last night in my dream I was surprised/confused by a restaurant owner who laid big platters of free food on my table, so many that finally other paying clients would come to take a share.  Then the restaurant had a power outage.  Then it turned into a story about jealousy.  Someone please get me Daniel.)

The true meaning of the statement is: My morning speaks about my life.

I woke up with sore limbs.  Hours of lawn work last evening.  "I ache in the places where I used to play..."  Every time Cohen got to this line in a concert, the audience would find fulfillment in turning their anticipatory smutty smirks to a collective bawdy roar, angels shot down to meet us at our place, desecration that points us to the sacred, classic Cohen modus operandi.

If there is a true religion it would not be the end of our quest but the true beginning of it.

I see life as two twin quests, ourselves not going between them but on them both in parallel, not unison.  The quest that starts first is for us to die to something.  Then the second catches up and urges us on to live for something else.

The language of our quest speaks for itself.

When one says she is now devoting her life to "Fight against Bigotry," what she means is I have a bigotry bigger than yours and you'd better watch out, the world better pay attention, for the real big B is in town.  Finally.  Judgement Day.

The most vociferous fighters against religion fight with religious zeal.  To think life is only about fighting against something is on no quest at all.  The fighter thinks he is fighting something out there, not dying to the bondage in here.  He can't find a way to be done with the harm his father has done on him; the demon that haunts him still is the shadow of a ghost that has already left the stage.

That's what I told myself when I said I don't read Richard Dawkins, as intelligent and well-versed as he is.  No one should pay attention to violent language.

But then right away I am confronted by my own bigotry: that I am dismissing a Person.  I found him disposable, like a piece of trash, something of no use to me, or had been used by me but now all but used up for me.

"There are no unsacred places; there are only sacred places and desecrated places."  Even more so about People.  One shouldn't love hate, but it doesn't mean we are to hate hate.

I suppose I am naive.  I live in a world where violence mostly needs not be called for (or so it seems).  I suppose a violent response is sometimes needed.

Well, he who speaks of and does violence wakes up to a morning that speaks for his Self.

Yours, Alex

Comments

  1. TimJune 4, 2018 at 11:27 AM

    So much going on here, Alex. I had to re-read this one, after your reflections on this in adult study, and your link from this morning's post (thanks for your overly-kind words). You are an academic--a lover of truth and beauty. And of Leonard Cohen! And, as I've said to you before, you are a paraklete--a coming-alongside-encourager.

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