Just a Word

It was just a word.
It was just a word, thoughtless perhaps.
It was just a word, like any other, but we had ignored the situation.
It was no longer just a word, in this situation.
It was a stone that we threw between us.
It was a rock from which a rock grew.
It became a rock because we could not push the stone away.
It became a rock, because we were always piling new stones on it.
It was a rock from which a mountain grew.
It was a mountain because we gave it space and moved back further and further.
It was a mountain and, step by step, we moved away from each other, each on its side of the mountain.
It was a mountain, so we could not see each other.
It was a mountain, an apparently insuperable intermediate-us.
It was an inter-us that cut us apart.
It was an intermediate and we continued to breathe.
It was an inter-us and we wanted to turn around and go.
It was an inter-us, and yet it was only a word.

Just now, we had been so close, and now was the cold and the isolation and the separation. And still we could not go. Just now we had known each other, and now there was only I, you on your side and me on my side. We should have fallen. Actually, we should have been lost. But we were not, for there was something that held us, not only in the I, but in the We. There was something bigger than the word, bigger than the cliff, the rock, the mountain, the intermediate we could not stop. There was something that separated and interposed us and covered the isolation and pain again and wore us. There was something that let us know that the Inter-Us was not indelible. There was a foundation that we had built and carried us.

And again it was just a word.
And again it was just a word, thoughtfully.
And again it was just a word, quite different from any other.
And again, it was more than a word to be separated in this.
And again, it was more than a word that brought us back and connect us.
And again, it was more than a word, soft and sweet, and yet so powerful that it could carry the intermediate between us.
And again, it was more than a word that gave us the foundation to feel, straightened and brought together.
And again it was more than a word that made us recognize.
And again it was more than a word which led us back to what was buried among us.
And again, it was more than a word that gave you back to us.

We will not be able to prevent the scattering of stones between us, but we can hinder the creation of an intermediate between us.

It is never just a word.