Of Lust and Other Holy Wars

Some wars leave bodies—charred, broken, little more than numbers on history’s page, however many pages that will be. Other wars leave souls—ragged, trembling, half-alive and half-ash, try as we might to remember them—we can’t, really—and still we carry them, like wounds stitched into the silence of our surviving. I have fought in the second kind of war.

At some point—no hallmark like age or season, but an internal moment as monumental as tectonic movement—a person learns that to want is to suffer; not wanting is to rot. I’m speaking now as my own lover, but not in relation to any one person. This letter is not to a lover or a god, but to the nothingness, the empty space between both. This letter is not to a beloved—because I have crazy fucking mistaken too many people for salvation—but also not to the gods, who have taken their sweet time stapled silent in their ivory or nothingness. It’s a confession, and an anatomy of self destruction, and a eulogy for all of the lust that both birthed and burned alive in me.

What is lust, if not an uprising against mortality? A sensuous scream into the void of a cold universe. Long ago, I abandoned the infected line of thought that flesh lusts for flesh. No — the body is only a doorway. It is the soul—ravenous, rushing, unfulfilled that begs for a passage through the temple of flesh. We do not lust for bodies; we lust for meaning that moans. We want to convince ourselves that pleasure stops the abyss from yawning endlessly. But — how many times have I drowned with another only to wake up more thirsty than before?

They say lust is the most primal of urges. They say it's a beast; an impulse, a fall. 

But I have known lust differently. 

For me, it has never been merely the desire of skin-on-skin — no, that is too base; too niggardly. For me, lust has always been a form of reverence. The body bending, a sticky and confused adoration. The breath is a licensed prayer. The kiss, a kiss. And in those moments, I believed — stupidly, perhaps beautifully — I was reaching for eternity through a human's touch. 

But of course, eternity does not live in moaning mouths and trembling fingers. 

There have been times I tried to talk about this to others — they almost always flinch and laugh or call it a delusion. That is the problem with lust — the second we really try to penetrate our lust, we are taught to feel, not to think. We are taught to consume, not to contemplate. But I've always found it impossible to think while I feel. That is both my disease and my divine verdict on life. Every time I let myself open up to another, every time I yielded to the temptation of warm bodies, I wasn't just looking for pleasure — I was looking to escape emptiness. I was stalking divinity, my body an offering. And that is where the betrayal begins.

No one can bear the burden of being your altar. No one can hold all of your metaphysics in their hands without quaking. They came to me for skin, and I gave them my soul. They came looking for a night, and I gave them a lifetime. They left with the flame, and all they left me with were the ashes.

Is that not its own kind of war? The war of giving too much and being hatefully punished for it? The war between the body’s promise and the mind’s infinite desire? I have fought on both sides -- I have been the giver and the beggar, the sanctuary and the desecration. I have known the sweet joy of being adored in passionate moments, only to be forgotten once daylight strikes. I have known the fire of flesh, yes -- but more importantly, I have known the cold that follows after the warmth dissolves, and all that remains is your name strewn across a bed too big for one.

What is lust, really?

Is it the mind refusing to die quietly?

Is it the soul trying furiously to feel significant in a universe that has none to give?

Or is it simply our refusal to accept that we are alone?

All three, perhaps.

And maybe lust is not sin at all, but simply resistance.

Resisting the slow death of being out of sight.

However, I also know that no quantity of bodies can shield you from your solitude. No kiss can lead you far enough away from the background noise of your own mind. No touch, regardless of how sacred, can take the place of yearning for someone to understand you.

I have touched beauty and found nothing.

I have kissed lips and found an absence.

I have gone into temples and found no deities.

Yet... I still come back.

Still, I hunger.

Not because I am weak, but because I am human.

And at its essence, humanity is a series of holy wars fought between desire and loss.

They call it lust.

But what it truly is - is grief.

Grief with a heartbeat.

Grief ordered from a catalogue.

Grief moaning “stay” in the middle of the night and pretending, even briefly, that anyone ever does.

The saddest part is that even in a moment of horrible clarity at the absurd futility of lust, I cannot stop.

No matter how many hopes I dig to grave depth, buried under the stone of philosophy, I still hurt.

I still reach.

I still close my eyes when I hear the right voice.

Still, imagine tenderness as redemption.

Truth is, what else are we but animals, with delusions of divinity?

Lust, love, God, philosophy... each is a way to name the ache.

And so this is my gift - not to you, or to them - to the ache.

Let the war rage.

Let my hunger inscribe its name in the stars, even when the stars never read it.

I was here.

I reached.

I burned.

There is no lesson at the end of this letter, no redemptive verse, no ultimate truth.

Only this:

I burned in the holy fire,

I am ash now,

But I still carry the perfume of desire.

And maybe that is enough.

Yours,

- A Martyr of The Holy Wars

(the person who once mistook lust for salvation)

The Pilgrim of Holy Wounds 

(from the rubble of too much wanting)