Soft Petals, Sharp Thorns

He left a tiny pink rosebud on the front porch pillar yesterday. I don't think he has ever arrived without a gift or a blessing for me -- tonight a strawberry, earlier this week a wildflower bouquet...a wild asparagus bundle from the orchards of Hoodriver, a juicy mango. I remember that he arrived with two oranges the first time he visited me, back in January of this year.

That is what he has brought me over these months of loving and healing and relating...real nourishment...exquisite beauty. He has been a blessing in my life. We have experienced the depths of love, the ecstasy of love and the pain and agony of fear and separation. We have burned through illusions of who we are...we have raised monsters from the dead...skeletons we thought were gone...emerged again from the closet to be witnessed, loved and transformed.

We have burned through the illusions of what love and loving is. We have burned through illusions of what we are supposed to be for one another. We have allowed one form of the relationship to die so a truer expression and connection could be born. Tonight we completed another phase and form of our relationship...and we entered the void again, seeing what, if anything awaits us now.

In this relating, I have been stripped down. My heart's armor dissolved. I have allowed another to lead me into facing aspects of myself I have been concealing for years -- the dark and the light. I can't speak for him, but I see the same transformation occurring within him. An alchemical and beautifully riveting, heart penetrating relationship.

And it hasn't been easy. It has been quite challenging to love the ugly, as Heather says, to see the ugly within me and within him and to stay present, breath through it, experience the fear and the anger and stay in. And yet, in this humble place, miracles have occurred, love has taken root...a love for Self, a love for God and Life...a love for one another. This is the promise and the fulfillment of love...of loving...of staying in the crucible...staying in the fire long enough to receive the gift.

This is what I believe Jesus was saying when he said, "det haboon had l'had akayna d'ena ahabtekoon" ....Love One Another. Love one another without condition, look out for one another as the pupil of your own eye, feed one another with the manna of Life.

I am grateful for being opened in the Presence. I am grateful for this raw exposure to life, to others, to my own heart and essence. In the Gospel of Mary Magdalene she says, "he is calling us to be fully human." I am understanding that now.

Mary and Jesus...oh yeah, they've got it going on. I am following them into this crucible.
Guide our way into Love...Amen.