Melancholy & Unrequited Love
Melancholy, coming in paroxysmal storms of depression and self-pity, casts its dismal gray shadow over me from time to time. I am appalled by this weakness in myself, and ashamed, too, but nevertheless every so often dark clouds of it settle into my psyche, controlling my thoughts, making them as black and foreboding as the dank recesses of a medieval dungeon. When melancholy comes, it tries to destroy me – to drive me into madness over my Zahir. It takes all of my emotional strength to stand before these gale-like fits of melancholy until they pass. They seem to be swooping down on me, like an eagle over a coot, more and more frequently, and so I have decided to write about them in an effort to face them now – head on at a time when my spirits are solid – with the hope that confronting the next one before it arrives will allow me to ward it off with a shield of awareness, understanding, and rejection.
It is the longing for her that drives me down, lays my heart bare, allowing the melancholy to overcome my mind and judgment, and rip at my soul. Yet I know this terrible longing for her is at the core of my weakness, and that my coveting of her is indiscreet and immoral, for if I love my Zahir as much as I profess in my mind, I would not covet her so. She belongs to another who has given her a good life; I have nothing to offer her except what I perceive to be my everlasting love.
In Stephanie Meyer's "Twilight Saga" the young vampire's love for the girl who loves him is so strong that he refuses to defile her even though she wants him to. It is this axiom of love that so many of us, including me, fail to follow or to even comprehend. At worst we confuse love with our own selfish desire; at best we justify our love with our demands on the one we love. Is this really love at all?
In my essay The Union of Opposites I tell of John's desire and eternal love for Mary Magdalene. It is obvious that his love for her is genuine, for he places her own love for Jesus and Jesus' love for her above his own, though he writes ". . . my blood rushes young again just at the thought of her. I could never love anyone but Miriam . . . ."
My Zahir has told me repeatedly, over several months, that she cannot give me everything that I want. When she says those words it angers me, and I blame her for not understanding that it is only her love that I want – that I do not want to possess her. She, of course, knows better, for she is a goddess, and far smarter in the ways of life than I am. She has given me her love. She has given me her compassion. And she has nurtured me. She says I want more, and I argue that I don't, but I know she is right.
What have I given her? I've given her affection, attention, little gifts, and workplace help, but little sign of love. I make demands on her in the name of love that are impossible for her to honor. I have been possessive, even jealous, of her, yet I have no claim to her. She says I push too hard, and I say it's because I love her, and because I love her I have a right to pursue her and to expect her to return my love in the way I want her to. She disagrees. She is right. But I deny the reality. I simply ask that she give me one more chance and tell her that I will do better next time.
She repeatedly acquiesces, perhaps out of pity or maybe genuine love, to my pleas for her friendship, and when she does I soon want more from her, and there my selfishness rears its ugly archonic head, and I ruin the very relationship I have fought so hard, time after time, to spawn. And then it starts all over again, just about like the story in the "Groundhog Day" movie. I've been given chance after chance from her, and I've blown them all – except for the last one, though I've come damn close several times.
There is a tension between us, though, and it stems from what I've done to her before. She doesn't trust me to do the right thing. Once again she is right, and I'm sure she is pretty sure that my effort to give her my honest love will fail. This is the crux of what causes my episodic fits of melancholy. I want her too much; the love I have for her is self-centered desire to possess her in every possible way. When I am objective and rational about her, as I am trying to be now, I have to wonder if what I feel for her can even be called love, for my love for her seems to be more about me than about her.
But still she is my Zahir, and she is in every thought I have – a part of every breath I take. And I know that my uncontrollable longing for her has its base in my soul, where there lives the deep love and reverence I hold for her. In this way I am at constant war with myself: it's the archons against my soul.
Rumi said "Longing is the core of mystery. Longing itself brings the cure." I suppose the cure can be either madness or holiness, as Faubourg Saint-Peres pointed out in his thoughts on the Zahir. In my melancholy state I am resigned to lunacy, but after the storm I find new hope in sanctity. This war of vacillation between the archons and my soul is like good and evil, love and hate, right and wrong – the divergence of the opposites.
As I write this, I feel positive, self-assured that I can whip the archons, and demonstrate to her in the proper way my unselfish love – a love that transcends the human flesh and mind – and that she will know the deep, true, soul love emanating from my heart.
Tomorrow, though, I fear that I will once again want her in my bed to share with her the kind of love that she cannot take nor give. And then the black melancholy will envelop me in the darkness of the caverns of my mind.
vvv
Copyright (2009) by Albert Lloyd Williams
It is the longing for her that drives me down, lays my heart bare, allowing the melancholy to overcome my mind and judgment, and rip at my soul. Yet I know this terrible longing for her is at the core of my weakness, and that my coveting of her is indiscreet and immoral, for if I love my Zahir as much as I profess in my mind, I would not covet her so. She belongs to another who has given her a good life; I have nothing to offer her except what I perceive to be my everlasting love.
In Stephanie Meyer's "Twilight Saga" the young vampire's love for the girl who loves him is so strong that he refuses to defile her even though she wants him to. It is this axiom of love that so many of us, including me, fail to follow or to even comprehend. At worst we confuse love with our own selfish desire; at best we justify our love with our demands on the one we love. Is this really love at all?
In my essay The Union of Opposites I tell of John's desire and eternal love for Mary Magdalene. It is obvious that his love for her is genuine, for he places her own love for Jesus and Jesus' love for her above his own, though he writes ". . . my blood rushes young again just at the thought of her. I could never love anyone but Miriam . . . ."
My Zahir has told me repeatedly, over several months, that she cannot give me everything that I want. When she says those words it angers me, and I blame her for not understanding that it is only her love that I want – that I do not want to possess her. She, of course, knows better, for she is a goddess, and far smarter in the ways of life than I am. She has given me her love. She has given me her compassion. And she has nurtured me. She says I want more, and I argue that I don't, but I know she is right.
What have I given her? I've given her affection, attention, little gifts, and workplace help, but little sign of love. I make demands on her in the name of love that are impossible for her to honor. I have been possessive, even jealous, of her, yet I have no claim to her. She says I push too hard, and I say it's because I love her, and because I love her I have a right to pursue her and to expect her to return my love in the way I want her to. She disagrees. She is right. But I deny the reality. I simply ask that she give me one more chance and tell her that I will do better next time.
She repeatedly acquiesces, perhaps out of pity or maybe genuine love, to my pleas for her friendship, and when she does I soon want more from her, and there my selfishness rears its ugly archonic head, and I ruin the very relationship I have fought so hard, time after time, to spawn. And then it starts all over again, just about like the story in the "Groundhog Day" movie. I've been given chance after chance from her, and I've blown them all – except for the last one, though I've come damn close several times.
There is a tension between us, though, and it stems from what I've done to her before. She doesn't trust me to do the right thing. Once again she is right, and I'm sure she is pretty sure that my effort to give her my honest love will fail. This is the crux of what causes my episodic fits of melancholy. I want her too much; the love I have for her is self-centered desire to possess her in every possible way. When I am objective and rational about her, as I am trying to be now, I have to wonder if what I feel for her can even be called love, for my love for her seems to be more about me than about her.
But still she is my Zahir, and she is in every thought I have – a part of every breath I take. And I know that my uncontrollable longing for her has its base in my soul, where there lives the deep love and reverence I hold for her. In this way I am at constant war with myself: it's the archons against my soul.
Rumi said "Longing is the core of mystery. Longing itself brings the cure." I suppose the cure can be either madness or holiness, as Faubourg Saint-Peres pointed out in his thoughts on the Zahir. In my melancholy state I am resigned to lunacy, but after the storm I find new hope in sanctity. This war of vacillation between the archons and my soul is like good and evil, love and hate, right and wrong – the divergence of the opposites.
As I write this, I feel positive, self-assured that I can whip the archons, and demonstrate to her in the proper way my unselfish love – a love that transcends the human flesh and mind – and that she will know the deep, true, soul love emanating from my heart.
Tomorrow, though, I fear that I will once again want her in my bed to share with her the kind of love that she cannot take nor give. And then the black melancholy will envelop me in the darkness of the caverns of my mind.
vvv
Copyright (2009) by Albert Lloyd Williams
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