An elderly woman in the waiting room
at the doctors office won’t stop staring
at me, except when something drastic
happens on the corner TV.
It’s the afternoon stories, which all have
the same characters, just younger actors,
they had when my aunt used to keep me
after school as a child, stuck in the same
story lines, their lives moving much slower
than ours
and she is still staring at me
yet seems so much more complicated,
as if the writers can’t figure out what’s
next—and this is really about that, war
and peace, because killing others seems
to be the only way we know to solve
our problems, but don’t get wrong there
are always reasons why we do it
her eyes crawl the reaches of my face
This world is a scary place and if we run
they will follow and if we fight, someone
will die—because we are afraid or they
hit us first or they have something we don’t
so what is next? and when God calls for ‘just’
war in Samuel, yet much later says not one
should be hurt, where does that leave us?
i offer her a smile and somewhere between
the crinkles she brightens, the weight of what
is next for her lifts just a bit because
she is no longer alone in her-own-story
all i know is this, what is next
and along the
way as we give what is given to us,
peace becomes a virus we pass
with each touch—
(Brian blows my mind and heart wide open with his poetry… he is one of the most compassionate people I have ever met. I asked him to post here for Remembrance Day, knowing just that… Brian sees beyond. He sees with God eyes. Please visit him here…. and thank you, friends, for your wonderful, imperfect prose. I’m making my way slowly through your links… Love to you all. e.)