hope.

gravel angel in front of the Virginia Tech memorial.

maybe I'm just sentimental, maybe I'm over-medicated on dayquil and vitamin supplements (home, sick/miserable), maybe it's hormones or cosmic star-crossings... but this to me is beautiful.

I realize the paradox of symbolism - it has the power to inspire and yet lacks to power to itself act or promote change... so often many of us hide behind labels, flags, emblems, slogans, membership cards, resonant rally cries and yet maintain our lives of distance and quiet, turning a blind eye when we're most needed because we're uncomfortable or unwilling to risk our voices, time, reputations, comfort, money, self-image, etc.

And ironically it is most often the smallest and most minute of events that serve as catalysts for significant changes or enlightenment.

So often I think people just need someone to listen to them. The elderly are a perfect illustration of this... fear of mortality and the mysteries of life beyond our own tiny understanding of the universe compel some desire to leave behind us a legacy, some proof that our existence not only was real but somehow mattered.

We none of us seem to truly relish the fact that we are transient beings, just one of a succession of billions... Our misinterpretation of our own importance is the heartbeat of our ego-driven madness and anxiety. We inflate our worth far beyond the truth, develop grand notions of entitlement, as though the world owes us something. We live! Is that not enough?

Beyond that bizarre miracle our lives are our own, destinies our own, choices our own. Why is gratitude for existence so continually sneered at and discarded? The world can be terrible, cruel, wrenchingly painful, devastating, hopeless, unjust, and maddeningly overwhelming... and yet the sun rises, the tides change, leaves turn, and winter is always followed by the promise of spring.

It begins, it ends, it begins anew.

And in the midst of this we have each other... and angels made of pebbles as a reminder.

So kiss me when I'm hurting, whisper loving words in the ears of children, stare softly into the eyes of friends and extol their beauty, believe in the possibility of happiness, lend your strength to others, tread softly upon the earth, dance between raindrops, and sing in the starlight.

Gifts

My dream is the dream of a pond
Not just to mirror the sky
But to let the willows and ferns
Suck me dry.
I'll climb from the roots to the veins,
And when leaves wither and fade
I will refuse to mourn
Because I was dying to live.

My joy is the joy of sunlight.
In a moment of creation
I will leave shining words
In the pupils of children's eyes
Igniting golden flames.
Whenever seedlings sprout
I shall sing a song of green.
I'm so simple I'm profound!

My grief is the grief of birds.
The Spring will understand:
Flying from hardship and failure
To a future of warmth and light.
There my blood-stained pinions
Will scratch hieroglyphics
On every human heart
For every year to come.

Because all that I am
Has been a gift from earth.

- Shu Ting,
translated from the Chinese by Carolyn Kizer