Hold Life Open

In Michael Pollen’s book Cooked, in the chapter on Fermentation, he makes some comment along the lines that people who are easily disgusted are often terrified of death. I maybe making that up. I will fact check that. But I am easily disgusted, and I am also terrified of death. I want to hold onto this life with two strong hands for as long as I possibly can. But, then I read today’s entry in my A Year with Rilke, and I have to pause.

Advent Day Twenty-One, 2014, Melanie Mowinski

Two inner experiences were necessary for the creation of these books (The Sonnets to Orpheus and The Duino Elegies). One is the increasingly conscious decision to hold life open to death. The other is the spiritual imperative to present, in this wider context, the transformations of love that are not possible in a narrower circle where Death is simply excluded as The Other.