The either or

Collige virgo rosas (TBC)

How do we make the most of our states? Of the experiences we do not choose, that simply happen to us; transient phases that are and then are not, as quickly as they came to be.

We grasp at life - its fragile sinews snap within our grip, crushed by the weight of our longing; we enclose it, nurture it -it withers, smothered by an airtight, irreproachable caution. We shred it with precision; we dilute it, vying for transparency, with our expressions. But in our efforts to preserve life, to store it up within us, we begin to grow stale from the inside.

***

So what then do we do with ourselves? Whatever it is that we cannot yet understand, I think -

Distill it down; use a sieve, a filter, a flame; try making concrete what is abstract, permanent what is ephemeral, still what is in passing; the feelings that slip into our unconscious before they have taken form - they slide one into the other, shuffling, stirring, continually creating something new, brushing every fiber of our being in their ascent to the surface of our minds (or is it better to say that they descend upon us?)

Because who ever knows how long anything will last? If we will ever again feel meaning prick at our fingertips, so close within reach. If we will ever see the world with such clarity, such intensity, as it is - a spectacle, a wonder, a horror (Every angel is terrifying - Rilke). It is frightening, to think of how much we lose in the process of growing up, the wages of time we mistaken as a deposit. And as time takes its toll on us we endure, awaiting a return - but does it arrive?

I ramble. The ramblings of a young girl who has no claim to knowledge and little to experience. This quote strikes me:

"'I love,' said Susan, 'and I hate."... Though my mother still knits white socks for me and hems pinafores and I am a child, I love and I hate" - Virginia Woolf, The Waves

***

... is now the time for searching -
to store up, to be still -   

the pale period of hibernation before 

the creature emerges out of its cave 

into a bright new world that blinds 

and dazzles it with complexities

painfully wound around every experience,

inspiring the intensity that presses the pen

into paper and impresses meaning onto material -

before life?

but no, there is always a need -

for who knows when wonder will dry up and

leave the soil of the heart barren with indifference

and the gentle light by which infant eyes 

see the world is torn away by time, in its great envy

of youth, and they begin to adapt to the darkness?

- "Necessity", 17 November 2012

On boredom

I stood waiting, soaking in time. I tried to imagine person in a place and circumstance for whom freedom was simply to be unoccupied, idle. And all of a sudden, boredom became the wildest luxury - unimaginable. How is it that we have become so disengaged from living that life itself, the very air in our lungs, escapes us and creates in us such vacancy?

There has to be

 "Like all feelings felt for oneself, Mrs. Ramsay thought, it made one sad. It was so inadequate, what one could give in return; and what Rose felt was quite out of proportion to anything she really was." 
- Virginia Woolf, To The Lighthouse

Somewhere there is a world full of forgotten and unrealised selves, full of children and dreamers and artists; a world full of the life we have lost here on earth.

On space and freedom pt.1

It's been over a month since the last post but within that gap I'm back in London, settled in a new place and we're now nearly three weeks into school. And it's now past that time in the night beyond which one can't hope to accomplish anything very useful.

This post has been too long in the making - it's still a work-in-progress but there is nothing more restless than a thought left incomplete.

***

What comes to mind when you think about freedom?

I think of space. Boundless space. Unadulterated space. And in the middle of that vast expanse a little girl spins wildly, recklessly yet - with arms outstretched - she appears poised in an effortless balance. She staggers about as she turns, but never stumbles; creating incongruent circles in her course. There is space, there will always be enough space, she thinks to herself - not once does she worry about spinning off the edge, there are no such bounds. And in each and every moment before she halts  - pure elation.

But we live in a world of edges.

On the plane of our existence, there are edges on all sides. There is never enough space. Spin too fast, or with too much vigour, and you find yourself on an edge. The very act distorts your spatial perception, disrupts your sense of balance - an impractical pastime, too dangerous to be undertaken perched upon such a precarious precipice.

Often we spin anyway, tasting the air with our skin; our limbs swing loosely, collapsing softly against the wind. And we feel absolutely, utterly free. But then - an edge. And all of a sudden, gravity seizes us and we are captive, bound, at its mercy. The mirage dissolves into the desert sand, the thirst returns. It was an illusory freedom after all.

Toward the close of the novel Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre, the narrator Antoine, along his spiral into existential angst, sputters:

Is this what freedom is?... I am free: I haven’t a single reason for living left, all the ones I have tried have given way and I can’t imagine any more… I am alone in this white street lined with gardens. Alone and free. But this freedom is rather like death.

What is freedom, really?

Etymologically,

Old English frēo (adjective), frēon (verb), of Germanic origin; related to Dutch vrij and German frei, from an Indo-European root meaning ‘to love’, shared by friend.

Freedom finds her root in Love; to love is to free.

To love someone is to give him the space to be. To express himself, to act in - and sometimes out - of character. The space to make mistakes. To grow. To explore.

To be loved - truly, wholly, absolutely - then, is to have true, whole and absolute freedom. There is room for joy, and room for error. Breathing space. Allowance. And in all of this, there is a safety - a knowing, deep beyond doubt, that you are loved not for what you are in there here-and-now, but in the always-to-be.

Freedom is not obtained through solitary pursuit, but a relation.

Rilke, in Letters To A Young Poet, implores to his addressee, Kappus:

... believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.

An insurance, an assurance. A guarantee.

Freedom is found in this - a portrait of life framed in the knowledge of perfect love. Because perfect love casts out fear.