(Images by the Drifter)

“Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving / Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost.”

– Leonard Cohen

“Both in this world and in the Hereafter, I am the nearest of all people to Jesus, the son of Mary. He was not crucified.” – Muhammad

“Literature will lay truth open upon a higher level.” – William Carlos Williams

Our definition of love has grown too narrow, where we are now and here (2026 USA).

We say we love our spouse (if we are chained to one), our family, our new toaster, our new car, our latest luxury vacation. We say we love our new toaster, and the new (latest) technology they are always jamming down our throats. And all these things can be good to love. But loving them is not enough.

We say “LOVE” is about romance between two people (or three). We say we love the way our new lifestyle is turning out.

It is not enough to love but a few things.

The crucial message of Jesus, the one and only real message of his, the message the early Christians truly began to understand only AFTER he was gone (wherever he went), the message which completely contains all the other messages, the message that should be the ruling principle of the whole world, is this:

We should love LIFE ITSELF.

Even if we are being crucified.

On the cross, Christ cried out: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

Loving all of life itself does not preclude getting angry at God and asking WHY when right seems right. Jesus showed that too, as did Job before him. But in their despair, they were talking to God, NOT turning away from life.

There are many ways to talk to God and many moments, hours, or days remain for an opportunity to do this. It is NOT necessary to call it “prayer.”

Talking to God is loving life, no matter your method of doing so and no matter how angry you are. We are supposed to turn toward that when we are desperate, despairing or angry, if we can. God has a twisted sense of humor much like our own, it just may be. And just because someone doesn’t answer out loud doesn’t mean they’re not listening. Sometimes the best listeners never say anything at all. (And when She does speak, She speaks in a whisper, usually…)

Whether we are at the end of civilization or at the birth of a new civilization that is (almost invisibly) being built upon the ruins of the old one matters not one tiny jot.

Now is the time we have and now is the time we’re going a-swimming in. It never stops ticking by even for an instant even though it seems like it does, sometimes, if only for an instant or two.

It is good to love individual people, animals, plants, places, and even things, if you don’t go overboard on this last item, or for that matter any of the former items, either. Leonardo da Vinci loved water. He loved water, looking at it, dreaming over it, drawing it, writing about it, personifying it. Loving water was, for him, like loving all of life itself.

Loving only a few specific people or things is not enough. By far it is not enough.

We must LOVE all of LIFE ITSELF no matter what.

Those who do this are called by the Taoists “seed people.” Jesus also talked about those who sow the seed. There are many of these among us, but these days they appear to be in the minority BIG TIME as well.

Seed people love life even when they hate it.

They never limit their love to a single nationality, a single sexual identity, a single source of economic security, nor a single spouse who is your favorite personality.

WE HAVE TO LOVE IT ALL. All of life. Like we always continue to love the people who have left us no matter how they have left us but are still there in a different guise (as their spirits are haunting us in those things called MEMORY and DREAMS).

Jesus also said, “Do not throw your pearls before these swine.”

Because all they will do is trample them down into the mud.

The Drifter