Kind of Rain

_ What would you say is the essence of kindness?

_ A particular ordering of the alphabet.

_ I don’t suppose it would be of any use for me to say ‘You know what I mean’.

_ My answer to your inquiry was kindly. Picture kindness as rain. It has a beginning; it has an end; different flowers do different things with it. The rain - kindness - is an expression. If I want it to be sunny, and it is raining, I am at a loss due to my desire. The kindness of rain is in its insistent vagueness; it allows me to suffer. Kindness is not shaving when the razor is dull, nor when the mirror is broken. Kindness is that which leads to the end of suffering; kindness is the shattering of the illusion of self. All acts are acts of kindness. It - kindness - is the stranger who appears in our time of greatest need, and disappears without a trace. Look over there.

_ Where? Hey... Where are you going?

                                         <><><>

     ... Have you heard? We are to die.

     ... Insistence and resistance... What is love?


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