Olives of all the Greens of the Evening Sea
is it harder to see
beauty
in the world today?
harder to slide into
the ecstatic moment?
harder to be overwhelmed
with utter amazement at
what is?
is the World any different
than it has always been?
in kind, I mean?
what do we have today?
poverty … where soon
the 1% will own more
than the rest of the 99%.
one sixth of american kids hungry
and dying of no health care.
patriarchalists
driven by the religions of the book
oppressing women and gays
and those who don’t conform,
so-called christians promoting hate,
religious extremists creating deities
who then justify their callous, mean inhumanity,
fascists in capitalist clothing
destroying lives
with no sense of compassion
that central virtue of the buddha and the christ,
israelis cut adrift from yahweh’s hesed
committing genocide
against people
on the basis of a false history they fabricated
to justify their murderousness,
racist “white” americans
killing black americans
with power and weapons
driven by their fear
of a people they enslaved
and dehumanized
and who now terrify them
from out of the accumulated horror
and the utter bestiality
they used to perpetrate cruelty
in god’s name.
i could go on
the list is endless in this world
of the heartlessness
raging at the core of human existence.
the suffering that is destroying
of us all.
i am old now.
i can withdraw
and try to live
out of kindness
out of respect
out of acceptance
out of a wonder
at the beauty of being.
the world must be left
to others.
i am now free
to see myself
in those who bring
light and dark
on my daily simple path.
i choose to believe
in the utter amazement
of what is.
i have seen it.
it shall be my guide
to all of the olives
of all of the greens
of the evening sea.
* Title from Elizabeth David's Italian Food, location 437