Good morning everyone.
I’m glad to be able to share with you all a new poem, Blessing, published this morning at Your Daily Poem. I’ve also added the new poem to the collection, Augury, here on my website. Many warm thanks to editor Jayne Jaudon Ferrer, for intentionally selecting it to run on November 7, the day after this divisive 2018 midterm election.
A few thoughts on the poem:
I wrote this poem inspired by the form of an Irish Blessing, my favorite example of which is the the lovely Beannacht, by the late, great John O'Donohue.
The substance of the poem was in response to the stress I’ve been feeling about recent news cycles. This Blessing represents wishes for my daughter, her generation—and us all—in finding a way positive path through the fraught and stressful time we’ve found ourselves in.
The outcome of this latest mid-term election, I believe, is simply confirmation of what’s become extraordinarily evident to us all: that we’re more divided now than ever, as a society. Elections never heal us. Too often, instead, they deepen already open wounds, or pull apart those that have barely begun to knit.
But they also can be lantern, showing us more clearly where we stand. The really hard work of bridging, and listening, and questioning of our own assumptions, must begin now. These problems are not going to get solved by louder yelling, or greater outrage, or more reactivity.
I really appreciate you all, blue and red. You know who you are. I don’t expect us to be a great nation if we can only believe the same things—I expect us to be a great nation because we can believe different things.
But walking this path is hard. Our passions steer us astray. Our institutions are invested in pulling us apart. We must somehow still fight for what we believe is right, while also believing our opposition to be patriots with equally big hearts and best intent.
We all need a measure of humility, and quiet, and hard work, and luck to keep to do so. May we all do so. I believe we can do so. This is my wish, and my blessing, for us all.