HOPE

They tell me that, no matter what, I am loved. They tell me I am loved.

They tell me that I create my own reality; that all meaning is assigned, that I need a giant decoder ring to grasp the universe unfolding, an unfolding that I do not make, a universe that started before I came upon this sacred earth and will not stop when I am buried in it.

They ardently believe, not that I can be anything I want to be, but that I can be more of who I already am. The trick is to know thyself, they tell me.

They tell me I am loved.

They tell me to spot the signposts, the tap on the shoulder, the yearnings, the dreams, the synchronicities that make me say oh, my!

They tell me that I have but to look up to see the stars, not down, to look up & see the light, not dark, to look up to see the Master, oh master, I am but a boy who needs a guide, where are you when I need you?

They tell me to find my gifts, to seek my passion, to revere my values, hew to my purpose, sharpen my vision, define my beliefs: is that all?

They tell me I am loved.

And what if they are right, the oracles of this not-so New Age, what if they are right?

What if the love I need is wrapped around me like a blanket, and the pain that I feel only comes when it slips off my shoulder to the ground?

What if they are right? That loves wash over me all of my days, bursts from the heart, floods upon the wounds the world inflicted, what if they are right?

Right about the love that has always been there, waiting like a spring, deep in the ground, a well without a bottom, a darkness from the depth that scares me right before the flow begins?

What if they are right? Right about the scales that drop from our eyes, right about the golden splendor, what if they have always been right, the Spirit Ones, the ones I sneer at, not the churchy fools and heartless conditional love machines of the mega churches and homegrown jihads, not the silly robots of marching magazine subscribers, not the speeding fools on the superhighways without signs, not the ridiculous finger waggers with too many pets to clean up after and children that hate them.

No, I mean the real Spirit Ones, the ones I see as woo-woo’s, the Ones who buy the books in the incense burning storefronts and meditation centers atop the wooded mountains, the Ones who chant in tongues of their enemies and learn the lingo that stabs their parents in the heart, the Ones who trade their ties in for tie-dies and die tied to shapes other than the cross, cross with each other til they shut up and listen, the Ones who know peace.

What if they are right when they smile through the pain, when whisper like a lover on the next pillow and they touch me with their tears?

What if they are right when we take our clothes off in the street and run towards the sunset with a flock of doves and hawks in attendance in the open blue sky, as the end of the world draws near, and all we can do is laugh at the ridiculous joke we just got, a joke that took forever to understand, a joke which we cannot tell another, because there is no punchline, there is no line that I can use to pull myself in, reeling from the feeling that there is nothing but hope left in a nation of the hopeless, so get over it.

Get hope, get hopped up with the hope, hoping that someday, I’ll know what they are talking about, and know, not think, not hope, but really know that they are right when they tell me I am loved.