rally

“To Keep the Spark of Life Inside Me Ablaze”

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

Today’s Prompt is to write a poem to the world:

Beauty Was There
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

In the beginning, she hovered there,
above the waters, molding the land,
holding the world in her hands,
crafting a world of fire, earth, water, air.

In the beginning, she brooded,
her face obscured by shadows,
her thoughts filling the hollows,
her watchful eyes hooded.

She sent her dreaming forth,
streaming through the cosmos,
building like song to a crescendo,
filling newborn skies with morning.

In the beginning, she listened
for colors that flew in the wind,
singing that blew through her mind,
waves of color and sound risen

from deep within her breast.
Her thoughts became matter, feeling
mattered, materialized into being,
unbeing fled as her moon rose in the west.

And today we un-matter her being,
un-materialize the thoughts she formed,
de-stabilize the dances she performed
to set it all in motion. We’ve set it reeling,

ripping the fabric she wove.
It cannot be too late to change our ways,
to seek again the rhythm of her days,
to turn to her again and call her Love.

“At the end of the day, we can endure much more than we think we can.”
–Frida Kahlo
***
A little story by Amrita Nadi:
At the end of a talk someone from the audience asked the Dalai Lama, “Why didn’t you fight back against the Chinese?”
The Dalai Lama looked down, swung his feet just a bit, then looked back up at us and said with a gentle smile, “Well, war is obsolete, you know.”
Then, after a few moments, his face grave, he added, “Of course the mind can rationalize fighting back. . .but the heart, the heart would never understand. Then you would be divided in yourself, the heart and the mind, and the war would be inside you.”
***
“There are moments when I feel like giving up or giving in, but I soon rally again and do my duty as I see it: to keep the spark of life inside me ablaze.”
–Etty Hillesum, An Interrupted Life
***
“Always there is something worth saying
about glory, about gratitude.”
–Mary Oliver, What Do We Know
***
*Do your little bit of good where you are;
its those little bits of good put together,
that overwhelm the world.
–Desmond Tutu
****
“You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake.” –Jeannette Rankin

Gratitude List:
1. Strings of geese like beads across the sky. Fly well, Bright Ones!
2. This microwaveable bag of lavender and beans. It makes me warm and it eases the residual aches.
3. Wise friends
4. Tenderness. Basic kindness.
5. Stories of miracles and wonder.

May we walk in Beauty!

Black Lives Matter

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

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It was heartening to see so many people gathered for the vigil in Lancaster yesterday.  I couldn’t hear the speakers very well–my ears have trouble sorting sound–but I caught bits and pieces, and I could see that people were deeply moved by the speeches.  Afterward, a young black woman stood up on one of the benches and gave an incredibly powerful performance of poem.  I was glad to see colleagues and students there, as well as many folks from Mennonite churches and the local peace and justice organizations.

Black Lives Matter
Don’t let that threaten you.
That doesn’t mean that yours doesn’t, too.
It’s a way of saying that black people should get an equal portion of protection and peace at this great big banquet table.

It means that a traffic stop should be a traffic stop.  Routine.  “Oh yeah, Officer, I forgot to put my inspection sticker on there.  I’ll do it as soon as I get home.”  And a “There you go, Son–just a warning this time, but you go home and fix it up right now, or next time I’ll have to give you a fine.”

Not a broken-tail-light, I’m afraid you’re going to shoot me, so the demon of terror-of-young-black-men pulls my trigger and kills you in front of your lover and a child.

When that has become the routine, it’s time for some big words on a page, easy to read, easy to speak, easy to call out at a rally:  Black Lives Matter.

Of course yours matters, too.  That’s a given. We know that all lives do.
Let’s just focus on keeping the black lives alive for a while, okay?
Then when it looks like all lives truly DO matter here,
then we’ll go back to saying that all of them do.
When it’s true.

Gratitude List:
1. Communities rallying to say to stand up for Black Lives.  Please don’t let the momentum stop here, don’t let Philando Castile and Alton Sterling become quiet footnotes.  Say their names.  Believe so deeply that all lives matter that you can walk with those whose lives are threatened and anxious because of the color of their skin.  Black Lives Matter.
2. Good conversation with a dear friend.
3.  Looking forward to several days with my college friends.  They ground me and help me to re-situate myself in the long timeline.
4. The way the light shone over the ridge as I was driving home last evening.  The sparkle on the fields.  A different sort of evening sparkle than we get in the hollow.
5. Exploring semantic implications.  Words.  Meanings.

May we walk in Beauty!