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Persian Buttercup
Damariscotta, Maine; Inn Along the Way/Chapman Farm
In the beginning, was the Word. The Word was with God, and ... the Word was life. The life was the light of everyone. And the light in the darkness did shine, but the darkness could not see it [or, overcome it].
*Gospel of John 1.1, 4-5
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She asked the Sage, "Do you have any suggestion on how I can stop this overwhelming fear of death? I've done all I know to overcome it." "Don't try to overcome it," said the Sage. "To vanquish the fear of death, fall in love with life."
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymous Sage."
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What a surprise!
I suddenly realized
the sheer miracle
of simply being alive
but "How?"
All I can reply is ...
"Grace!"
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The idea that spirituality or religion is mainly about getting to a heaven or out of a cycle of birth and death detracts and distracts from the sacredness of life here and now. Instead, prepare for death by dying into life. This dying means falling in love with love. What is or not afterward will not be or will be. Anyway, if you don't know how to love life now, how will you just because later you die?
What is this life to fall in love with? "Christ" is another word for life. To say "life" is to say "Christ," and to say "Christ" is to say life. This life is not the details most call life. Life, instead, is what gives those details vitality, meaning, and hope.
When what you call your life is united with life, whatever happens from that point becomes the instrument of a higher purpose than mere survival or pleasure. In union with life, you become the servant of life. In service to life, you transcend the details of life while becoming intimate with them, sacralizing them by your very presence. When oneed with life, you are life.
Oneed with life, you realize what you most aspire for is not existence. Rather, you yearn to be alive... fully. You realize a life beyond the conceptual opposites nonexistence and existence. You know life is, but you cannot say what it is - you have become that alive, that en-livened. You have become that human, that in-spirited. You realize you cannot speak that you are and have become... we are, everything is.
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A man asked the Sage, "Do you think we'll live forever?" "Not now," he said,"not now." "But what about in the future?" "Not now, not now." So, you think we'll just become nonexistent?" "Not now, not now." The man walked away, thinking the Sage quite strange.
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymous Sage."
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*©Brian K. Wilcox, 2022.
*Use of photography is allowed accompanied by credit given to Brian K. Wilcox, and title and place of photograph.
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse.
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