012615 - Poem: "Olives of all the Greens of the Evening Sea"

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