Out Beyond Ideas of Wrongdoing and Rightdoing

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
There is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
The world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
Doesn't make any sense.

EACH OTHER

author:  Tegan Johnson

I watch with intentional distance as my fellow countrymen tear at each other – reveling in the tragedies of people they have never met – professing to know who they are and the intentions they hold in their hearts because of what they’ve heard or read – a form of celebrity based on a slice of knowledge – transposed over everything they stand for.

Unstoppable, this momentum toward anger and hatred, as if creatures with hands of tar are pulling us downward leaving greasy, black streaks on our skin and hair – marks that we blame on each other. Marks that fuel fear and loathing.

Will we recover? CAN we recover? Do we WANT to recover – to LISTEN to each other – to try to UNDERSTAND each other? To be HONEST with each other? Have we come too far? Are the scars too deep? Is it too late to pull back from hate?

Do I stay silent, and distant? Do I watch with morbid curiosity as we increasingly agree on one thing – that we do not want to hear each other – that we hate each other.

I cannot. Even though my words may be washed away by waves of intolerance and the growing tide of Us versus Them. I have to at least ask, the question. Is there anyone left who wants to heal, who wants to repair the damage we’ve done – to each other? Or am I alone – do we no longer have – each other.