Loving people means summoning them forth
With the loudest and most insistent of calls:
It means stirring up in them
A mute and hidden being
Who can’t help leaping at the sound of our voice
A being so new
That even those who carried him
Didn’t know him
And yet so authentic
That they can’t fail to recognize him
Once they discover him
To love someone is to bid them to live,
Invite them to grow.
Since people don’t have the courage to mature
Unless someone has faith in them,
We have to reach those we meet
At the level they stopped developing,
Where they were given up as hopeless
And so withdrew into
Themselves
And began to secrete
a protective shell
because they thought they were alone
and no one cared.
They have to feel they are loved very deeply
And very boldly
Before they dare to feel humble and kind,
Affectionate, sincere
And vulnerable.
(Louis Evely, 1964)