We are being urged
from every side
to become efficient
rather than intimate.

by Thomas Moore¹

I

Tuco considered the war in his heart.
It had gone on long enough. This internal fear of being simply who he was
in a world that placed little value on the intimate details of landscape.
Everywhere, both external and internal landscape were under constant urban renewal.

The natural lost at every turn.
He lost and rediscovered the natural.
But it was wearying to track the continuity within the urban changes.

the soul's complexity is achieved over time,
through error and extreme....
We are guided by our emotions,
by pain, by the feeling of going wrong.
The point is...
not to arrive at some static point of perfect balance.

by Thomas Moore¹

II

The good in it all, Tuco realized, was he kept an eye on the horizon.
No balance found, no static line of indecision bounded his day.

So the horse began to move through the grass, sniffing and snuffling.
Odd to Tuco that this horse did that now.
As though the horse sensed his feeling of going wrong.
Or was the horse facing something similar? Tuco wasn't sure.

He knew complex horses and simple ones.
He wasn't sure yet, which one this horse was.

Then another horse called in the distance behind them.
He turned to see Arlu riding the roan toward him.

the partners know that we are all individuals,
with our own kind of richness that may not be
fully and plainly revealed in daily life,
and that an intimate relationship demands
a courageous and openhearted acknowledgement of difference.

by Thomas Moore¹

III

Tuco couldn't explain what troubled him, even to himself, let alone to Arlu.
He was surprised by her equanimity with his doubt.
Something shifted within each of them, a balance found in the difference.

Life was good
scary
but good.

The soul doesn't have to know what is going on in life.
It doesn't need interpretations, explanations, or conclusions,
but it does require musing, reverie, consideration, wonder, and exploration.

by Thomas Moore¹

IV

Tuco remembered the rides in his youth
so long ago!
Yet so clear, the wonder and exploration
the interplay of horse and rider
of other and self.

This had been good learning.
And, somehow, he found Arlu
without explanation or interpretation, she was there.
A soul so intwined and intimate with his
he couldn't imagine any other life.