don’t you see:
there’s enough
alienation in the world
as is
– we don’t need yours too
I know you thought
you
needed it
to belong
but that’s not true
(and it never was)
((and that was never true belonging anyways))
what we need
is
your humanity,
please
don’t
withhold
it from us.
we need
your beauty
your ugly vices
your neurosis
and your virtues
we need that fear you have of intimacy
we need your capacity for hope
we need your grief that threatens to swallow you
we need your joy that sometimes surprises you like a sunny day in midwinter.
and that too:
your struggle to assert yourself
your longing to be loved
your fear that maybe you’re irreparably damaged
and your intuition that maybe
it doesn’t actually matter
because
your dignity was never up for grabs.
we need
these things
because
they remind us
of what it
is to be
human
don’t you see:
your humanity
is not the
liability
you
always thought
it was.
how silly
to think you could
belong
by way
of evading your
human condition.
and yet
claiming
your
real
human
condition
as
really yours
is the only
criteria
there is
to belong
at all.
it is the
only
means you have
to find
all that
you long for.
don’t you see:
the liability
is not your humanity
but your alienation to it.
your being human
in all its
unsightly
beautiful
brawny
delicate
awkward
adaptive
uncoordinated
contradictory
homely
hardy
healing
glory
gives us all
permission to be
these things too.
your pain:
mobilizes
connection.
your wounds:
create
the possibility for solidarity.
your fear:
generates
a common search for life.
and your joy:
that imbues us with hope.
your presence:
reminds
us that life is worth celebrating
your authenticity:
permits
us to be too.
don’t you see:
when you abandon
yourself
you abandon
us all.
if humanity
is going to survive
we need people
brave enough to
be human.
after all,
an integrated world
requires
integrated
people.
so please
give us what
you’ve got
your being here
helps
us remember
who we are
and
what
we’ve been
all along
and
what we might
just become.
SO VERY HUMAN 