a new perspective

i thought i understood these poems when i first read them in high school. i realize now that i had no idea.

i think im starting to get it now. 
intentionally hurting someone in order to illicit a reaction to make yourself feel loved is never okay.  i feel so foolish to be discovering this now, but when youre in the midst of the storm, its hard to see the light. praise the Lord for every broken moment.  He restores, protects and provides. i cant ask for anything more.

The More Loving One

W.H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well

That, for all they care, I can go to hell,

But on earth indifference is the least

We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn

With a passion for us we could not return?

If equal affection cannot be,

Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am

Of stars that do not give a damn,

I cannot, now I see them, say

I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,

I should learn to look at an empty sky

And feel its total dark sublime,

Though this might take me a little time.

Altruism

Molly Peacock

What if we got outside ourselves and there

really was an outside out there, not just

our insides turned inside out? What if there

really were a you beyond me, not just

the waves off my own fire, like those waves off

the backyard grill you can see the next yard through,

though not well—just enough to know that off

to the right belongs to someone else, not you.

What if, when we said I love you, there were

a you to love as there is a yard beyond

to walk past the grill and get to? To endure

the endless walk through the self, knowing through a bond

that has no basis (for ourselves are all we know)

is altruism: not giving, but coming to know

someone is there through the wavy vision

of the self’s heat, love become a decision.