Tuesday, June 25 I will
Tuesday, June 25
I will be afraid again, I wrote when myself threatens to overwhelm me, and when the terrible voids open below my understanding. But let me never, never lose sight of this - that the universe is founded upon joy, that an infinite and terrible love lies beneath creation and above it, and permeates every fiber of its being. The universe is founded on joy, too great for our understanding, joy even beyond happiness or unhappiness. "Lighten our darkness, Lord," we pray, and we are right to pray so. Lost and in terror we do cry to him out of the depths. But nothing is lost that is within the love of God. There is no imperfection within love, nothing that is not known by name. Love is around us and within us, love is the reality of our existence, and we wait for the day when we shall see clearly the love in which we have our being, and when our happiness shall be joined at last to the joy that anchors reality. Lighten our darkness, O Lord. Give us eyes that we may see the light.
I paused, reflected, drew a breath, skipped a line.
I do not think this is a mood swing, although I do not doubt but that I shall be afraid and lost again. I know the reality of this is different, in the way that a man who awakens from a dream knows which world is truly real. You believe in the reality of dreams while you are dreaming as strongly as you ever believed in reality while you were awake. But none can ever mistake the voice of a god for that of a mortal.
When you were talking earlier about the fear… I remember times when I too have been gripped by it… as you were telling your story, I reflected that it might be different for me, less terrible a thing, if I believed in God. If beneath it all, I felt that one support.
But what you say here. This… this I think I do believe.
October 19th, 2002 at 1:10 am