One Love

Sometimes we think love only has to do with big red lips on a movie screen or particular body parts. Most of us have been socialized -- at least in this culture -- to imagine that love only appears in certain forms, is unpredictable and unavoidable (like a car wreck), instinctual and manifested only as lust or motherly hormones.

I believe love is the breath in our bones, deeper than space, as multifaceted as life itself, and more amazing than rainbows. No matter how dense the darkness, the smallest candle can light the way. And nothing, nothing can erase its truth or its effect.

I choose to love. In the face of all greed, ignorance and cruelty. In the face of all the sorrows of the past -- personal and historical. In the face of all Power. I see love in the eyes of humans and animals, in the branches of trees, and in the ring around the moon. I dance to love in music, drink it in the form of colors, celebrate it in stillness and will it to surround and sustain all who suffer.

Our campus has been blessed this semester by a healthy contingent of Nepalese students and I have seven or eight of them in classes. One day at an exam review session, I asked them to teach me a Nepalese greeting and they replied "Namaste," putting their slightly cupped hands together under their chins.

"Oh, yes!" I responded. "I read somewhere that 'namaste' means 'God in me recognizes God in you'. Is that correct?"

They considered this for a moment and then suggested instead that their translation might be more like: "You are so beautiful, I want to make my hands into a flower and give it to you."

Namaste.