Hell is not below us when our bodies die. Hell is on Earth, in our lives. Only our bodies die; our spirits are infinite. So why does our spirit join another body and return to Earth? To learn that Hell is an illusion of the finite, that Hell can become a Hello to Heaven on Earth through Love. All creations of the Cosmos must first be nurtured by Love to effloresce their own innate Love. That full Love is the antidote for Hell on Earth. We must be Loved so that our full Love can be shared with those who hurt and hate, thus transforming Hell into a Hello to Heaven on Earth, changing hopelessness into hopefulness. But we can give only what we have received. So if we fail to be Loved at conception, through our earliest of years, and then through the rest of our lives, at any point someone who has been fully Loved can intervene by Loving the one who is in Hell on Earth. There is no such thing as a surfeit of Love. As one is nurtured by another's Love, the deprived one will feel and find the efflorescence of Love, and what was before Hell on Earth will become a Hello to Heaven on Earth. Hell will be understood for what it truly is: A call for help. And Love will be known by all creations as the magic and truth of the Cosmos.
A graduate of Andover and Columbia College, Columbia University, Tod Howard Hawks has been a poet and human-rights activist his entire adult life. He just finished his first novel, A CHILD FOR AMARANTH.