quote | to be a full human being

It costs so much to be a full human being that there are very few who have the enlightenment or the courage to pay the price.... One has to abandon altogether the search for security, and reach out to the risk of living with both arms. One has to embrace the world like a lover. One has to accept pain as a condition of existence. One has to court doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing. One needs a will stubborn in conflict, but apt always to total acceptance of every consequence of living and dying.
-morris west

lovers.

i stared at unabashed lovers on a mid-morning hike.

two different trees forming so natural a connection. 

taking slow dance to a different realm of comprehension;

they count in decades, not in steps.

swirling at each other's branches

leaning in and out

bending by the month.

i wonder if they resonate with this poem by ee cummings.

quote | the cost

"It costs so much to be a full human being that there are very few who have the enlightenment or the courage to pay the price. One has to abandon altogether the search for security and reach out to the risk of living with both arms open. One has to embrace the world like a lover. One has to accept pain as a condition of existence." - Morris West
Source: quoted at herondance.org


what does it look like to "embrace the world like a lover?"