Thursday Poem - Wage Peace

Wage peace with your breath.

Breathe in firemen and rubble,

breathe out whole buildings and flocks of

red wing blackbirds.

Breathe in terrorists

and breathe out sleeping children and

freshly mown fields.

Breathe in confusion and breathe out

maple trees.

Breathe in the fallen and breathe out

lifelong friendships intact.

Wage peace with your listening: hearing

sirens, pray loud.

Remember your tools: flower seeds,

clothes pins, clean rivers.

Make soup.

Play music, memorize the words for

thank you in three languages.

Learn to knit, and make a hat.

Think of chaos as dancing raspberries,

imagine grief

as the outbreath of beauty

or the gesture of fish.

Swim for the other side.

Wage peace.

Never has the world seemed so fresh and

precious:

Have a cup of tea... and rejoice.

Act as if armistice has already arrived.

Celebrate today.

Judyth Hill