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You don't know how beautiful

You don't know how beautiful you are

You don't know, and you don't get it, do you?

You don't know how beautiful you are 

I’ll never forget the moment.  We were at the U2 concert and the band was playing Get on your 

Boots. You were standing and singing along mindlessly enraptured.  

I don’t think you heard me singing to you, but I was singing all night.  Given the quality of my voice and the competition, I wasn’t offended.  But you weren’t listening to Bono either.  Song after song both held you and missed you. 

The more you see the less you know

The less you find out as you go

But I want you to stop for a moment, take a deep breath, sit across from me, and let me look into your eyes.  When you look in the mirror it seems that you see everything but you.  Given your obsession with what others see when they see you, it’s somewhat surprising that you miss something as big as you 

But only somewhat surprising.  You only see what you want to see. I think you worry that if you gaze into it at a different angle, or with a different focus you will see yet another wrinkle and additional effects of gravity; and your collection of perceived physical flaws is so large you can’t bear adding even one more to it. 

Don't look before you laugh

Look ugly in a photograph

Flash bulbs purple irises

The camera can't see

You have beautiful eyes. 

Don’t look away.  

Your eyes betray you.   Why can’t you accept a simple compliment about the person you did not make and cannot hide?  

We both know.  It’s your shame.  You look at everything through a lens of personal shame.  You listen to everyone with the same filter.  From the moment you awake to the moment you retire, you are in hiding.  From God, from me, from your friends, family, and most of all you.  

You've got to get yourself together

You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it

Don't say that later will be better now because you're stuck in a moment

And you can't get out of it 

Don’t look away.  

I love you so much it hurts. 

When I get close, you push me away. 

When I speak, you aren’t listening.  

You spurn what you can’t believe.

Love. 

You've been running away from what you don't understand.

Love. 

I know you can’t bear to open your eyes, so keep them shut.  

But please listen. 

I love you and so much about you. 

Seeing you makes my heart glad.  Every moment. 

Your smile, your frown. 

Your honesty.  The heart on your sleeve. 

The intensity with which you live, and the gift you are to so many. 

I love the gift you are to me. 

I can see you pulling away from me just now.  I can see that every word I speak is like a dagger to you.  It's not that you disagree with me, you can’t even listen.  

I don’t know what hurts me more, the fact that you do not believe me or that you don’t hear me. 

I hate your shame and all who have shamed you.  

Your shame is so inhumane.  It tells you that to be human is to be perfect. 

And because of that you cannot understand how deeply I love your beautiful imperfection.  

"Human" perfection and love are incompatible. 

I can’t love your shame away.  Only you can love your shame away. 

You profess God is love, but in the physics of the divine, loving yourself is not optional. 

The reason I can’t hold back my tears is because I grieve so intensely what you are missing.  

And if you think I am grieving the fact you cannot feel my love, you still don’t get it. 

Loving you is pure joy.  You are wondrous and I know so little of you.  Coming to know a new part of you is the only gift I could ever want from you. You are divine.  You are uniquely you.  

I want you to experience what I am privileged to experience: the joy of loving you. 

Until you do, let’s not talk of loving God or neighbor.

Just know I will love you until the die I die.  I can’t help myself. You are so worthy. 

One day you'll look back, and you'll see

Where you were held now by this love.

While you could stand there,

You could move on this moment

Follow this feeling. 

It's alright, it's alright, it's alright.

She moves in mysterious ways.

It's alright, it's alright, it's alright.

Spirit moves in mysterious ways.

Rev. Dale S. Kuehne, Ph.D. is the author of “Sex and the iWorld. Rethinking relationship beyond the age of Individualism.”  He is the Richard L. Bready Chair of Ethics, Economics, and the Common Good at Saint Anselm College and founding director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College.  He a regular ShareWIK.com columnist. 

Read other columns by Rev. Dale Kuehne