Tag: Eros

Proof

Rita Sommers-FlanaganLeave a comment 

How do you know you are loved? Does it mean you get everything you ever wanted? How do you prove your love to someone else? What in the heck is love anyway? Is it like porn? Do you know love when you see it? Feel it? Trust it? Will it? Choose it? 

“Hello,” Love says. 
“Gaaa,” I say. “You’re not my grandma. Get away from me.”
“Howdy there, little lady,” Love says with a swagger.
“Don’t howdy me,” I snap. “I’m not your type.”
“Find me. Trust me. Uncover me,” Love demands.
“I can’t. I won’t. I don’t know how,” I shake my head, hands up, defensive.

“Good-bye,” Love says.
“Where’re you going?” I ask, suddenly afraid.
“Don’t know. Don’t care,” Love grins. “Want to ride along?”
“How would I know what I want?” I ask.
“Exactly,” Love nods.

Love settles on the couch. “Do you love anyone?”
“I try,” I say. “But not very well, at least by your standards.”
“And what are my standards?” Love feigns interest.
I consider this for a long while.
Love knits a blanket beside me, humming to herself. 

“Well, endurance comes to mind,” I finally venture. 
The guess is flat. Two-dimensional. Endurance is not that sexy.
“Good one,” Love says. “Say more.”
“No, you say more,” I counter.

Love leaps up and begins a seductive belly dance.
“Inward, outward. Yes. No. Not-you-ness. Enough. 
Letting go while hanging on. Balance.
Acceptance. Sacrifice. Otherness. Oneness. 
Shall I go on?”

“Don’t bother,” I sigh. “It’s impossible.”

“Absolutely,” Love stops gyrating. 
“I adore that about myself. I’m a gorgeous trip to nowhere,
a deceptively simple meal. 
Five sparrows with open mouths and winter on the horizon. 
I’m full of myself. Brimming, spilling, messy. 
I’m the first longing and the last drink.”

“Love,” I say plaintively.  “There are so many cold days and crushed dreams.
So many painful failures. Could I have that blanket when you’ve finished it?”

“No, honey,” Love says. “It’s not for you. 
You already have more blankets than you need.”

What? I am embarrassed. Outraged. My demons scream. The collective that I am rushes to the sea—the known and unknown, the just and unjust--intent on self-destruction. Intent on death. But Love calls to the heavens, and the entire crowd of me tumbles into the blue bowl of inverted sky.

Mick Jagger slides onto the curvilinear stage, clearly on a mission. “You can’t always get what you want,” he croons. I want to slap him silly but what’s the use? The truth is not his fault.

Formatting

Rita Sommers-Flanagan6 Comments

Phote Credit: Theresa Vandersnick Burkhart

“If you wanted to write a bible or some holy essays or something, would you use Word?” I asked the Source. “Would you store documents in the Cloud? Post directly to Facebook? TikTok?” My tone was edgy. Yesterday, I’d lost most of my skirmishes with technology.

God’s eyebrows arched quizzically. I waited in comfortable silence, enjoying the sensuous twist of driftwood and the undulations of the emerging horizon. I meditated on medieval monks brewing dark beer as they transcribed and illuminated ancient texts.

“I don’t write things down,” God finally answered. “The written word hardens and can become a weapon. It’s often misused. Have you considered the living word? It offers an array of formatting options that could keep you busy for centuries.”

Brilliant colors bled across the eastern sky, transforming the unspeakable terrors of the night into manageable commandments.

“Yes. On occasion I’m possessed by the living word,” I said “But I still love the written word. What would life be without bodacious, malapropism, or onomatopoeia?”

God’s gaze was steady. The carefully ordered syllables of my life started breaking free, combining and recombining. Recumbent. Iconoclast.  Greek. Mandarin. Farsi. Sanskrit. There are over 7,000 languages spoken by humans in the world right now, and who knows how many more existed before we started counting? And what about the languages of animals? Trees? Vibrations in space?

“Do you think we should include the living word among the list of functional modern languages?” I asked.

“Seriously?” God laughed. “Functional?”

A silver convertible, a rusty jalopy, an all-electric Ford Lightening, a school bus, and a fume-spewing Chevy paraded by. The Drivers grinned and waved.  Instead of candy, they tossed indestructible reading glasses. Delighted children grabbed them and put them on.

“We see you,” the children shouted at me. At each other. At the Drivers. “We see you!” They scooped up small animals, lonely widows, bees, and bones. “We see you!” they cried, rejoicing in their vision.

Their weightless innocence was infectious. I longed for a Buddhist-like acceptance. I’m always trying to weave the words at my disposal into an easily maneuverable raft or a safe path forward, but they often splinter or blow away, catching debris and damming up the Living River as they tumble willy-nilly in the crosswinds.

The Drivers got out of their rigs and circled me, holy eyes magnified by thick lenses, clownish smiles revealing large, sacred teeth. “Relax,” they said. “Word dams are an important part of the ecosystem. Just ask the beavers.”

“I don’t speak beaver,” I protested. “But you could,” they said, their heads nodding sagaciously. “It’s never too late to learn another way of seeing.”