Here, Beside This Great Black Surface That

Despite Everything, Life Is Full Of Beauty And Meaning.

I Don’t Want To Be Anything Special. I Only Want To Try To Be True To That In Me Which Seeks To Fulfill Its Promise.

When I Pray, I Never Pray For Myself, Always For Others, Or Else I Hold A Silly, Naive, Or Deadly Serious Dialogue With What Is Deepest Inside Me, Which For The Sake Of Convenience I Call God. Praying To God For Something For Yourself Strikes Me As Being Too Childish For Words. To Pray For Another's Well-being Is Something I Find Childish As Well; One Should Only Pray That Another Should Have Enough Strength To Shoulder His Burden. If You Do That, You Lend Him Some Of Your Own Strength.

By 'coming To Terms With Life' I Mean: The Reality Of Death Has Become A Definite Part Of My Life; My Life Has, So To Speak, Been Extended By Death, By My Looking Death In The Eye And Accepting It, By Accepting Destruction As Part Of Life And No Longer Wasting My Energies On Fear Of Death Or The Refusal To Acknowledge Its Inevitability. It Sounds Paradoxical: By Excluding Death From Our Life We Cannot Live A Full Life, And By Admitting Death Into Our Life We Enlarge And Enrich It.

The Externals Are Simply So Many Props; Everything We Need Is Within Us.