The Problem With Our Kiss

The problem with our kiss.

Is that I could taste our first one

when we shared our last one.

 

The problem with our kiss

was that when we shared that first one

I knew already

that the last was on its way.

 

The problem

was that their was a first kiss.

 

The problem

was that their was a last kiss.

 

The problem

was not so much

that I kissed you like my mouth was an escape hatch

I kissed you like the very most inner-secret parts of me

might escape out of my lips

 

and into you.

 

And the problem with our kiss

it was not so much that you did the same thing.

 

It was that we both did it

at the same time.

And the very best we could hope for

was a crash on our way out of ourselves

a colission at the boundary between us

Thrown back where we began

from the place we fled…

 

Or worse:

I might leave myself

and end up you

and you might leave yourself

and end up me

and there we would be

alone

still.

 

The problem with our kiss

is the rythmn to them

there is a give and take

a push and pull

 

When I tried to be the moon you were the moon too

and when you tried to be the waves I was trying to be the ocean.

 

You said that the problem with our kiss

Is that it was a metaphor for everything else.

 

I say that everything else

is just a metaphor for that kiss.

Published by

Jeff

The stories that speak to our soul begin at a home where things are good. Cinderella is happy with her father. The three little pigs have grown up and are ready to move on. Bilbo Baggins knows his shire. Adam and Eve walk with God in the garden. My story isn’t much different. There was a time and a place where it was so good. There was a community for me. And there was joy. We were filled with a sincere desire to do what God wanted us to do. We possessed explanations and understandings that went a certain distance. We offered security and tradition and laughter. For a lot of years, that was enough. I have this sense that it was also necessary. I have this surety, now, that it certainly wasn’t everything. There were some things that became increasingly problematic as time went by. There was a desire to package things up so very neatly. Sunday morning services were efficient and strategic. Responses to differences of opinion were premeditated. Formula began to feel more important than being real. A real desire for everybody to be one of us, but also a real sense that there is an us, and there is a them. They carried a regret that it has to be this way, but deeper than this regret was a surety that this is how it is. I began to recognize that there was a cost of admission to that group. There were people who sat at the door, collecting it. Those people wished they didn’t have to. But I guess they felt like they did have to. They let some people in, and they left others out. There was a provisional membership. My friends did possess a desire to accommodate people that are different… But it would be best for everyone concerned if they were only a little bit different. I did make many steps forward in this place. Before I went there, there were lies that I believed. Some of the things that I learned there, I still hold on to. But that place is not my home anymore. Those people are not my community anymore. There were times it was hard. I am engaged in a different community now. And I am working hard at finding a place in many different places now, embracing many different kind of families. I don’t always get it right. I am trying and I am learning and I am moving foreward. I have this sense that I am not alone in these experiences. I believe that we are tribe and we are growing. We are pilgrims, looking for a new holy land. Perhaps we won’t settle on the same spot of land. But if you’ve read this far, I am thinking that we are probably headed in the same general direction. I have begun this blog to talk about where my journey is taking me. In every space, we find people who help us along. And maybe we can get to know each other, here. We embrace ideas that provide a structure for the things we believe, and perhaps we can share these too. Maybe we can form a group, a tribe, a community, if we can figure out a way to work through the shadow of these kinds of groups, if we can bigger than the us-and-them ideas that have caused so much trouble in the past. As important as they are, I think the very nature of online interactions will lend itself to something equally powerful. I am stumbling onto these practices that my grandfathers and great grandfathers in the faith engaged in. I am learning about these attitudes and intuitions are so different than the kinds of things we call doctrine today. I don’t know about you, but I am running out of patience, and even interest, in conversations about doctrine. I hope that maybe you’ll share a little something about where your journey is taking you, and maybe our common joys and challenges might help each other along, and we might lift each other up. Thanks for doing this journey with me.

5 thoughts on “The Problem With Our Kiss”

  3. I’ve been staying away from your blog because I didn’t like the title.

    But now I’m here, and I like it. Congradulations.

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  4. Thanks for stopping by. I hope you’ll leave some comments.
    You spend some time commenting on others blogs. Do you have one of your own?

    The name thing is one of those “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” but ends up looking cocky, not tongue-in-cheek, like it was intended.

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  5. No – I kind of hate the idea of ‘wanting a voice’. I’m only a listener and talk to the people I know care.

    I guess I started on Marty’s blog just cause I was at Fellowship when he kicked it off and I read Katie’s blog cause she is my friend. Your blog is pretty much the first one I actually find compelling and an ‘exchange of ideas that causes my worldview to expand’.

    I also like Garret’s blog.

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