On Children
Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let our bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

So there you have it. You can see why it’s “off” to be concerned with having children acclimate to society. In the sense of adapt. They are not — essentially — part of the group. Not today. And they were only ever a “part of the group” when the clan or tribe respected the soul within the earthbound creature. Our anthropological studes notwithstanding, we have zero understanding with regard to the symbiosis of healthy societies and their… individuals.

I know of no one who (for certain) is clear about how the spirit of the child is crushed today… worldwide. In Japan, I remember hearing that “The nail that stands out will get hammered down.” Oh, how painful to even think about the various ways in which that is implemented, the insidious means by which it is experienced by the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

When parents lay down their societal injunctions, too often — much too often, almost always in the U.S.? — it has to do with the parents not wanting to be nails sticking out. Of course, the reprimands are coated with the respectability the comes from being concerned with the welfare of society, and the need to respect others. But, truly, they are, as a rule, coming from a place that recoils in horror at the prospect of having to deal with reaction to what’s wiggly about one’s offspring.

You don’t laugh here. You don’t writhe on the floor there. Oh yes, it’s quite understandable.

Like how having a flat table top is “understandable” in the context of needing a surface which will easily support glasses and mugs which require a 180 degree foundation. Though… if you thought about it… you could have cups that were not geometrically shaped, but which slipped into this or that crevice in a sufficiently stable manner… so that liquid contents didn’t spill over onto the lap of a… fellow citizen.

But that kind of thinking can’t go on with, blend well with our expedient momentum.

The Last Enemy — http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/lastenemy/ — centers on what is happening NOW, not in the future, present critical and popular takes notwithstanding. It is a horror that, apparently, only poorly acclimated children can observe.

“You can strive to be like them
but seek not to make them like you.”

We must risk being shunned, accept having a very small circle. Not allow it to be done to them, to have their souls snatched in the name of security and progress.

The few who can bristle should bond together. Not in any way that is precedented. This is new territory. But in some way that is meaningful. In some way that gives sustenance to the soul. You choose.

There is a soul. But who talks about it today? My Marcello does… without words… as a living example.

“The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky,–
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.”

A mere excerpt from Renascence, lines Edna St. Vincent Millay spoke to me just before she died… when I was about Marcello’s age. Lines she wrote — amazingly — when she was only about twenty. Lines she couldn’t have written if she had been molded properly. Lines I never would have heard if I had been….

The ultimate argument, of course, is “What if everyone…?”. Yes, what would become of us if that were the case? Neglecting The Fact that it would never be the case. Could never be.

I recently read a line about Sicilians… in studying the “support” that they extended to Garibaldi after he had contributed to their freedom in 1860. Apparently, they cheered him, and lavished him with words of praise, but they didn’t contribute money to his cause. Didn’t provide him with many troops. His fund raising fell flat, and attempts at recruiting didn’t match the general enthusiasm.

It seems as if a firmly entrenched, soulful tradition in Sicily took over. There was a saying, “Better to be an animal than a soldier.”

Wow. Imagine such a thought kicking in today.

Marcello will never be a soldier. I can say that without feeling that I’m not honoring what are, what will be (to return to Gibran)… his “own thoughts.” For he is very much in touch with “Life’s longing for itself.”

But… what would happen if everyone acted that way?

Indeed, what would happen?

Love,
Richard
P.S. Perhaps you shouldn’t read any further, but…. The overseas abominations lightly touched upon in http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081027/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_syria_us_raid echo the domestic horror focused upon in Thomas McCarthy’s The Visitor, a sweet new cinematic release. It is the warp and woof of our societal fabric, coming undone as I write… irreversible by virtue of its not being acknowledged (in action) by sufficient numbers. To speak of legitimate (violent) defense of these so-called United States of America, as is done by a well-meaning member of Veterans for Peace in Mike Whitney’s well-meaning article http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney10272008.html is to miss the point. There is no more time left to dialogue about the pros and cons of this and that policy… when our momentum is clearly slated to carry on with rotten-to-the-core USer exceptionalism and the sick, tired old notion that we can thrive even if others don’t survive. There is only… heartbeats… time… remaining… to honor Life’s longing for itself… which should always be held above the mundane considerations which seem to rule the lives of just about everyone I know personally… and otherwise. That must start with your children and/or the nonviolent child within you. You are your own worst enemy. Your only enemy.