Thank you, my friend

"I hold this to be the highest task of a bond between two people: that each should stand guard over the solitude of the other."

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

I have a dear friend who is somewhere within love's reach. We don't speak to each other often anymore. We lost track along the way, but our hearts never spun out of sight. He has suffered tremendous loneliness and alchemized it into a solitude that I hold close to my own, at times fragile heart. We are both writers but tend to get lost in everyday customized language games. We are both adept to adaptation, and I have felt drawn often to playfully invite him away from the colorless middle ground. I miss him, but I don't. We both speak the same love language that solitude offers us, and thus know how to converse without using words, time or even space. A hint of magic supports our shared belief system. I know we will always be connected, funny enough in an emotional place far away from norms, consequences, or roles. Our friendship has a lasting existential quality, in the sense that we remain each other's witness even if we would never share a direct experience ever again. Him being part of my own stream of consciousness renders my experience of loneliness utterly understood and a vital remembrance of the void out of which we all emerge. At the contact boundary of our experiences, even if out of touch, we enjoy a horizon sharply perceived through the eyes of those that suddenly stopped seeking refuge in outside distractions. Although that horizon keeps suggesting there is more to explore within this connection, just staying present with the promise feels already like a gift to this friendship. Feelings are wide, memories are joyful, pain has been a source of softening laughter and existential grounding. Thank you, my friend, for everything and nothing at once.