Sometimes I wonder if there is ever a comfortable place between us, where we can sit and be and wonder about things. I wonder if there is ever a simple place we can rest, and talk, and share in our natural delights. See, there is this place called “out there” that seems to scare us into frozen inaction, forcing even the most comfortable of places to remind us of hideous darkness that does not even exist there. Sometimes it seems we create our demons in the most perfect places, and make them whole, convincing ourselves that this is how it must be.
And sometimes that “out there” resides in the deepest places within us. Sometimes we are so beyond ourselves that we have no idea that we have become an alien even to our own hearts. Sometimes we have become so tainted, so jaded, so absolutely scarred that we have no place left to injure, to hurt, to feel well again. We fear “out there” so much we forget to live, or we lie and pretend that the box in which we have confined ourselves is living without walls. Somehow stepping in became stepping out, and we even lose track of our own direction.
Sometimes “out there” is where two hands meet. It’s almost as if the world will end if fingers intertwine, if the flesh itself molds into one place where two souls meet. It’s like the Universe fearing the big bang, a human fearing conception, fuel fearing flame. It’s almost as if we choose to live in hell, and then name that place “heaven” in order to live there with some kind of acceptance. How will I ever know anything if my feet never touch the ground out there?
Sometimes “out there” is where my lips meet yours. It’s as if we have climbed out from the cragged foothills of our lives and we fear falling back into them if we simply love. It’s like I fear that if I inhale your breath I will be stealing it, and if I give you mine I will lose myself out there. It feels as if we fear the darkness with such vigor that we will never discover the light that exists out there. We forget the joy, the promise, the potential of the very act of love. We’ve been caged for so long we’ve learned to love our imprisonment and, in turn, have created and enemy out of the very thing that frees us.
There are so many “out theres” and I want to conquer them all, and jump freely into them with enormous joy and confidence, and utter fearlessness. I want to discover them, and know them, and beat them where they stand so that love itself is so natural that out there cannot exist anywhere. I want to make each and every out there an “in here”, and want to make them places I can go to in order to freely understand my place, my heart, my world so much better. Fuck the parachutes and ropes and belays, let me crest the summit and dance in the valleys with equal joy and equal strength.
It is not a strong man who clings to the box and rigid ideals of his forefathers. I’ve tried that, rarely venturing out of there despite my deep desire to do so. Practicing machismo and exercising my strength make me pathetically weak, but it’s easy. We gain acceptance there. We are praised there. We learn to live for all of those “out theres” that we forget who we are. That’s when out there becomes “in here”, and in here becomes a foreign land to the enslaved. Well, for me I want to keep jumping into the dark places, and live or die to tell the tale.
I love you, for some strange reason I am a man who loves you. Despite my strength, my size, my fierceness, I love you. Despite my brain screaming logical things, I love you. Despite my hardness I am soft there, where I love you. Despite my shallowness I am deep in those places where I love you. Despite my comfortable little place here, I want to jump out there where you are. I want to taste it all, feel it all, and never forget the fragrance where you stand. I want to take your hand and run with you, hear that laugh, kiss those lips and jump anywhere a dark place exists.
I think the trees outside this window are laughing at me. Maybe it’s me laughing and me blaming the trees, but in the natural world this would not be a debate, or a question, or even an uncertainty. I would be there.