What is Courage? Facing and forgetting an impossible past with unsentimental stoicism.
What is Love? Let go, but never forget. Smile, beautiful - gimme an image to remember you by.
What is Heartbreak? "As life wounds us, so art must wound us. We are tormented by the delicate, indefinite pain in art; the heart cry of the lover, the failure of realization of the desire, the finite mind stretching to comprehend infinity - these are our sorrows. We pleasure in the perfection of our self-torture; we love to mock and sneer at ourselves; we flagellate ourselves with our own failures. Masochists all we love to be hurt and we love to have our unhealing wounds opened and reopened again; we sit staring at the mirror of art, fascinated by our own deformities." (Allen Ginsberg, July 28, 1944)
What is Sadness? Goodbye.
What is Hope? See you later.
She said goodbye.
Passion implies suffering - not in the Messianic context - but in the very real embodied experience of human affection. I never understood what, "It's better to have loved and lost, than to have never loved at all" really meant. It's often regurgitated - which explains why I equated its common usage to a lack of profundity. My prejudgment is not true of course. One must experience lost - irredeemable lost - to appreciate the Bard's words. I loved her. I lost her. And I - now years removed - can honestly say I have no regrets. Darling, I wish you nothing but the best. We will always have our moment - one that you've most likely forgotten and will live on with me - sharing a pack of Starburst sitting along library bookshelves. I love you, darling; I always will.
