WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

July 4, 2021

DURABLE

(Here are some words I wrote 17 years ago, on June 24, 2004:)

            On my 62 mile bike ride today (yes! I rode my age!), toward the end I paused on a bridge over a graceful stream of water, and I got to thinking about the durability of that small stream. That water, I thought, has probably been flowing exactly like that for hundreds of thousands of years. While the human race was conducting war after war, while sorrows of immense proportions were sweeping across the land, while billions of people were being born and billions were dying, this little babbling brook continued to pour over these rocks near where I was standing with my bike. In its soft, persistent way, it was too strong to be stopped. As I watch the water quietly flowing across stones, I thought of another powerful river – only this one has been flowing for all eternity and is completely impossible to stop. I was thinking of the river of love. What can stop – what has ever stopped – this river from pouring strong feelings of kindness and goodness into hearts surround the world? For untold millennia, human beings have been feeling this powerful flow of love, even in the worst of circumstances. Has a tornado brought disaster to a town? Love is right there, quietly flowing through and among the townspeople as they rebuild their lives. Have terrorist struck again and destroyed the hopes of hundreds and thousands of people? Love is right there, softly pouring across the suffering hearts to soothe and strengthen them. There simply is no situation that can dam up or sidetrack the endlessly durable stream of love. Like the little brook moving under the bridge where I stopped on my ride, love just quietly keeps doing it’s immortal and mighty work.

And two fairly recent poems …

HOW TO STAY COOL

Keep a cooler in your quiet heart.
Keep some thoughts of ice and snow,
memories of kindness shared in December. 
Write with cold pencil lead 
the coldest, clearest words. 

A NEW MORNING

So the old world turned,
and the words of sunshine 
were spoken. 
That's all - 
just a loving sentence in the trees,
and phrases of kindness 
across the waters,
and the lit-up life of poems 
in the air.
All faces were forward,
all arms were swinging, 
all hearts were heavy 
with happiness.