WE HAVE NOT FAILED, WE HAVE NOT FALLEN, FOR WE HAVE LOVED
Having come so close to deathwe cannot trust the future now.Our Home is this moment.Our Trust roots itself in this moment.Not as theory, not as abstraction,but as some kind of ancient burning.
Yes, we may be broken on the altar!Yes, our certitudes may have crumbled!But we are no less for that.We are no less for having loved in our own way.And no less for having 'failed'in the world's fearful eyes.I do not know.
I do not claim to know.But I cannot turn from this burning now.And we are still breathing.I can still hear you breathing.I am still breathing.And we are still breathing.More frightened than ever, perhaps, yet somehow less afraid.
More groundless than before, yes, yet somehow more sure.And less numb. And less willing to turn away.Less willing to think our way through.More able to feel our way down.And less shame at feeling.And less shame at being ashamed.Oh, the old voices come, of course.
Turn back!You aren't strong enough!You're not worthy!This is all a mistake!You are so far from where you should be!Fuck the voices. I mean, love them, yes. Love them dearly, but fuck them.They do not represent the truth.They are only echoes, memories of the old life.The stale life. The life that didn't fit.Our new life is emerging, my love, here on the altar,the last place we would ever lookfor creation.
Stay close to the birth.Stay close to the breath.Stay close to the burning.Nothing will happen except the crumbling of tomorrows.It is safe to feel unsafe; we can hold each other here.As the fires come closer, remember the Source.This Unbreakable Light.This closeness to Home.That sense of wonder we had as children,when we danced so imperfectly in the forest.
That look in mother's eyes the daybefore the chaos, before the calm,before we first heard the Laughter.We have not failed, we have not fallen, for we have loved.
- Jeff Foster
