theophiliacs

What is it to love another? To give, devoid of obligation? To harness a sinking capstone? I do not know it. I am obliged, my footing is weak.

Steps, cautious, lead my person to the bluff ahead. I tremor.

And what of love’s impression? A selfish and relentless impulse, it drives me away from rationality – forces my hand. Love’s chemist is a barbarian. Deep admiration is not the great act of the ages. When is love of pure motive, no motive?

Shaking now, I reach the crest.

My barrier to this is selfishness. I am misconceived in believing I should feel good by love. To love another is beyond assumption, achievement. My preservation takes an illicit first priority: a sycophantic pedestal of insecurity.

I lay down the stones of fear, I summon him through sobs of loathing.
Upon my altar of selfish motivation I call forth pain.
He rises from below, a freezing river.

My sickness lies: pain and love are the same. Emotion and logic rob me, as they are being robbed from me. I am stealing from myself to feed a liar.

Seizing now, I am awake and asleep.
This is the drowning nightmare. Skin becomes scale.

Pain is introduced, an inevitable acquaintance, I expect him to grasp me. I expect him to drown me. I expect him to spirit me away. The sea draws near, it calls to me: existence is pain; a destruction of ebbing tides.

A beam of heat.

The river stops, frothing at the mouth of the sea. Existence has an adversary. Pain has a healer. The warmth dries up the river, it sets me on the bottom of the dry channel.

I am still now. I slumber, a good death.
In my slumber I recall those altars upon which I warm:
a youth group …
a greek lab …
a small classroom …

Love is Immortality, a fire that tears off scales – revealing wings.

I dawn my cape