Being saved

The world is violent and mercurial--
    it will have its way with you.

We are saved only by love--
    love for each other
        and the love that we pour into the art
            we feel compelled to share:
                being a parent; being a writer;
                    being a painter; being a friend.

We live in a perpetually burning building,
    and what we must save from it,
        all the time,
            is love.
                

    Tennessee Williams, in Follies of God by James Grissom