The Peace-Maker

for Christiane It takes a true believer to do this work. In some places, telling people you study peace is like telling them you research unicorns. It takes one kind of belief to hope for peace, something like the good wishes of a well-meaning person. But to devote your life to the finding out of How and Why Not Peace here and now or someday soon to come--this requires a monastic devotion. To live across an ocean, in a land where sometimes you feel how small the world has become, but mostly the vast curve of the globe yawns its mouth wide as if to swallow you. To labor with your little ones waiting for you, to work deep into the dark places of their slumber, to write when you'd rather crawl in bed and just hold them. Most days, the world does not deserve such people. It is happy to spin on its axis of resignation, to shade its cynical side from the sun. Thank the Light She is more persistent than that, thank Her for breathing a flame into hopeful hearts every morning. Thank the wind for stirring a storm that grows the flame into a blaze that animates a woman's body, giving her enough fire to rise again, to study while her children wait. To search for the answers, the keys that will unlock conflict (our old friend), and save our sanity. Save our humanity. Save our lives. She will write while her little ones slumber, work deep into the dark places instead of crawling under their covers and holding them. May we deserve her devotion.

Comments

[Christiane]

It's not the right word, but I have no other: Thanks. Thanks a million.

[Trish]

Poetry, pure potent poetry...your words are a balm to my soul today...remember in this moment that you are a spark in the radiance of sunlight that illuminates our day.

Trish

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