Born to Die

Perhaps, if I toil, and have the fortune of living long enough, I may one day translate words from thoughts from my heart such that another may read, and think, and know my mind, and love my heart... And if I succeed - it shall be forever - my heart preserved for eternity. And, against all odds, I will have prevailed over death. But what is this dream? Merely a sad settlement - a shadow grasped for because I know the substance is beyond me. For what goodness is there in being loved if one never knows of it; if one can never return the favor? I would sing half a duet into the void. Whether or not one sang the rest in my absence, it would not be love - just a melancholy whisper in the wind. But you came, O Lord, with a true plan to vanquish death - a victory not just for yourself, but for all who are willing to see the Truth - for how could one look with an honest heart and not love? You are the Word - one living syllable that cannot be forgotten or erased. The poet cries at your beauty - your beauty that is power unimaginable. Power to vanquish death for all time. You came to suffer for love. You chose to be born to die. You showed us the way... And till my last breath I pray for the grace to learn how to live - how to die. How to transform my mortal impulses into eternal desires. How to build - with you and through you - the poem, the song I have searched for ever since I fell in love with words. How to die without fear of death - knowing that my life and death - through you - will become a chapter in the book of eternity, a couplet in the eversong, a reborn heart free to live with you and love you and know your love - forever. 2025-03-22 10:32-10:54 at St. Raphael Retreat Center in Dallas, TX