Love's Effigy

When I was a child, society taught me how to be loved:
I had to act a certain way,
Pick a certain job,
Look a certain way,
Believe certain things,
And always give to everyone,
Laying down my life for others,
Taking the smaller half of a shared piece of cake,
And being totally intolerant of anything and anyone that deviates from the acceptable norm,
Even to the point of self-loathing
When I did not conform
 
But love must be freely given to be love,
So if I am changing who I am or altering how I act
Or choosing a certain look, occupation, or belief,
To make someone love me,
I am not really being loved,
I am manipulating people into demonstrating affection
For an effigy that isn’t really me
 
And I think maybe it takes great faith to be yourself
And trust that love will come to you anyway,
If you choose to do what makes your heart sing,
And to express your authentic inner soul
 
What a strange and inexplicable world we live in
Because there is no truth in
“If I’m good, they will love me,
If I love them, they will love me,
If I’m kind they will love me,
If I follow the rules, they will love me,”
No simple bridge from cause to effect,
But only others’ incomprehensible choices that I cannot affect
 
But that’s the only way it can be, after all,
If love is really to be love
How terribly, terribly terrifying this is,
And yet, somehow, it’s beautiful, too
 
Maybe someday we will all have the faith that it takes to be ourselves,
And then society won’t place so many conditions on love,
And it won’t be so terrifying and lonely to be authentic,
For we will truly see and honor each other for the beautiful individual that is each of us
And there won’t be such a disparity
Between authenticity and being seen as valuable
It is then we will have closed the gap
Between being true and being chosen,
And it is then we will burn love’s effigy
In order to love unconditionally
 
And our society will be healthier,
And the individual will be healthier,
And the world will be so much better
When we can all be loved for who we truly are.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dust

 Dust is inherently spiritual, As we see from the fact that matter and energy inhabit both sides of the equals sign In the relative equation of life And though I was taught to value the things of the spirit beyond the things of the earth And then vilified for doing that too much , Still, I came to a place where I could be aware that they are and always have been the same   Dust to dust, As they say, And “from the dust you came, to dust shall you return,” But what happens to dust after dust it becomes? In thousands of years when the dust is pulled together again By the turbulence, gravity, mass, and heat That create the stars themselves So that we are born from the dust anew Even as we will one day return to the dust again In the neverending cycle of beginnings and endings, Perhaps dust is the constant in all of this change, And perhaps as we sweep it away with a rag on a Saturday morning, Or bury it in the ground on a Tuesday afternoon, Stare at it in the mirror on a Monday before wor
Read more

Fears

Sometimes I feel like I am surrounded by enemies, dancing all around me Screaming Shouting into my head, into my heart In the mornings before school, And at night before bed When I can't stop thinking, can't stop thinking of all the mistakes I could make tomorrow, Remembering all the mistakes I made today, and yesterday, and the day before that one The times I screamed at kids, failed to motivate them, The times I didn't teach them anything or made them feel stupid And the enemy screams and shouts and pounds his drums In a frenzy And all I can hear is how awful I am And how I should quit and stop and leave and go And it's hard to hear the still, small, quiet voice of truth in my head, In my heart, Telling me what I've known all along, but forgot Forgot, forgot, forgot In the frenzy and pounding and screaming of the fears That tell me that I don't deserve to be here And what difference do I make anyway? But He just spoke to me yesterday, tol
Read more

Editing

It's so interesting to read something I wrote a year ago and see the seeds of the Revelation I have now planted there, To be able to trace over time The Path that Yahweh has shown me and through which He has grown me To see the seeds of Infinity in words upon a page, And I wonder what seeds are in me now, And what they will look like when they come to full fruition, How they will blossom and bloom And completely change my life and the lives of those around me, How they will make all things new and better and more Real Because Yahweh is in them, in me Even now, And oh the marvel and glory at how He chooses to plant His seeds, The perfection of growth, That all circumstances must come together perfectly for fruition, Sunlight, good soil, pure water, Truth, Spirit, Faith, All mixing as One to produce the perfect conditions for Harvest, And even the process is its own beautiful creation, That the product is its own beauty, but the process another, A double port
Read more