I tell the gods are still alive / And they are not consoling.

There are some griefs so loud/They could bring down the sky/And there are griefs so still/None knows how deep they lie.

When we speak of being vulnerable, it suggests being especially vulnerable to pain. People for whom personal dignity and self-sufficiency are everything, do all they can to shut it out. Noli mi tangere. They are well aware that any intimate relationship has pain in it, forces a special kind of awareness, is costly, and so they try to keep themselves unencumbered by shutting pain out as far as it is possible to do so.

life is always bringing unexpected gifts.

Life comes in clusters, clusters of solitude, then a cluster when there is hardly time to breathe.

... love is healing, even rootless love.

It is dark now. The snow is deep blue and the ocean nearly black. It is time for some music.