Dustin Pickering writes

The Fallen Nature of Love

lines from Stabbing Westward’s Wither Blister Burn and Peel with responses from St. Augustine’s works and my own comments

[Don't you believe that there is in man a deep so profound as to be hidden even to him in whom it is?]

Whose obsession clings -- a rough image of the beloved? Whose teasing conscience opens wounds so deep no one can fathom? How does a man recognize himself in his loved one?

I'm such an asshole, God I'm such a stain
I just keep fucking up again and again

[It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels....]

Again the night is only stars coated in darkness – darkness visible, the Original Sin. Death is in the garden…do you understand now?

I only see myself reflected in your eyes
So all that I believe I am essentially are lies
And everything I've hoped to be or ever thought I was
Died with your belief in me so who the hell am I?

[Since love grows within you, so beauty grows. For love is the beauty of the soul.]

I command the earth its pause. We aren’t saved by motion or force, but the mothers of the earth will carry us in the womb, bliss, again as we nod to sleep.

I know exactly what you're thinking
But I swear this time I will not let you down
I'm not as selfish as I used to be
That was a part of me that never made me proud

[Beware of despairing about yourself; you are commanded to place your trust in God and not in yourself.]

What is real…is the real ordinary? Can you feel? Is love real?

I can't believe
In anything sacred
When I don't believe
That I am real

[The truth is like a lion. You don’t have to defend it. Let it loose. It will defend itself.]

I don’t know how to kill -- my mind is not equipped to isolate itself completely.

I feel complete
I breathe you in
It's where you end and I begin
If only I could stay here...forever

[To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek him the greatest adventure; to find him, the greatest human achievement.]

What is salvation but a light declaring its truth? Empty are horizons, but I never tread the long road.

It's not like you
Can save me
It's not like you even care

[A man may lose the good things of this life against his will; but if he loses the eternal blessings, he does so with his own consent.]

It is not holiness to enshrine oneself through others -- I devise a solemn fear and trembling. We are devils.

My soul, a shrine I've built for you
I've got nothing left inside me
Nothing left inside but you

[Bad company is like a nail driven into a post, which after the first or second blow may be drawn out with little difficulty; but being once driven up to the head, the pincers cannot take hold to draw it out, but which can only be done by the destruction of the wood.]

Heaviness is the gravity of conscience. You weren’t meant to hold truth in someone else’s eyes. Those eyes were not yours.

I'm feeling the weight of the world
And it's crushing me

[By means of corporal and temporal things we may comprehend the eternal and the spiritual.]

Violence is the perpetuation of disguise. Those who act on violent urges hide their wickedness. They cannot be true. Do not follow them. Do not let them lead.

Where she plays contently
She leaves this nightmare far behind
She escapes inside her dreams

[Do not believe yourself healthy. Immortality is health; this life is a long sickness.]

You can’t give all when you have nothing. Life is a sickness, death is the cure.

I gave it all
But no one cared
I feel it slipping away

Saint Augustine -- Philippe de Champaigne