In the stillness between breaths, there is no boundary, no edge I can grasp, only the eternal hum of an unbroken unity that is neither here nor there, neither this nor that. The nature of oneness is its unspeakable truth, a truth not known but simply lived — a truth that cannot be grasped, no matter how we stretch our fingers toward the horizon.
It is not the absence of proof that keeps us from knowing it, but the very nature of it, this oneness that blurs every distinction, that shatters the need for knowing, for experiencing, for remembering. It is a silence woven into the fabric of all things lived, a silence so profound it cannot be heard, a stillness too vast to be felt. In that silence, we are not, we simply are, unmade into a singular form, no name, no face, no longing.
Yet here we stand, free-fallen droplets, threaded out from that vast ocean, given a form we never requested, a body, a mind, a self, each one distinct, each one born into a strangeness we cannot comprehend. It is a gift, perhaps the greatest of all, to be invited into this fleeting experience, to wander through this brief encounter we call life. To be an active participant in something so infinitely small, yet so charged with meaning, so charged with possibility.
In this world, there is love — the precise tension of hearts trying to remember something they cannot, trying to touch what cannot be touched. And there is separation anxiety, the pebble in your shoe as you walk through a theme park of dreams, fine-tuning every step, scraping as you go. You know you have come a long way from home, and yet, this is home. Your feet ache with the longing for what cannot be named, but you press on, because this is all you’ve known, and you know that you must press forward.
It is always there: that tension, lingering, reminding you of where you once were — where we once were. But it does not demand our perfection. It only asks we continue, that we continue this dance, however imperfect, however incomplete. To continue pressing on toward a love whose fabric unfolds in the tiny details of this brief passage — toward a reunion you know is coming, even as you can never see it, never experience it.
And so, we walk. We walk with the pebble, aware of every step, aware of the ache and the joy of being here, now, threaded out, for this brief, stunningly precious moment that will never come again. For 9 seconds.