the murmur of the world

"if nothing's okay, then it's okay."

"in the compassion that turns to the other, there is fear that the other will not be able to endure and fear that the other, mired in pain, may not be able to obey the summons addressed to him. the other feels the touch one brings to him as a force come from elsewhere that draws him out of his pain, mired in itself, and draws him into a suffering that depersonalizes and that is no longer his alone, and no longer his.
one goes because one finds oneself compelled to go; one goes so that the other not be alone in his or her dying. every move of one's hand that is moved to tact and tenderness acknowledges the imperative addressed to one in the susceptibility of the other. one has to suffer for the others and with the other. the grief, when the other has been taken and no medication or comfort were possible, understands that one has to grieve."

community arises not from the ability to understand one another in discourse, but from a willingness to engage despite this lack of understanding. what brings us together is death. not the fear of dying, but the removal of a closely connected member of a community. compassion is the communication which requires neither words nor symbols, only a touch or a presence.

if our rational society is a cloth on which all points are connected, then give me the tears in the fabric; the holes through which shines the light of imagination, whimsy and metamorphosis. with these thoughts, we have ended our journey around the island, which we go to because we have to.