Tangible Substance
Who is mankind that we may opine and orate about peace?
Other than declare we would do well to embrace it,
somewhere between the alpha and the omega,
what we offer is just words words words
drowning in the truest depths of swirling unworthiness.
Are we not an adulterous species with our unbridled consumption
of Mother Earth and her most vulnerable children,
our demands
far beyond our needs, far beyond “enough”, far beyond
her capacity to recover?
We curry the favor of rulers and legislators, grovel
before celebrity mega church pastors, many of whom
strut through this world with swollen heads and bloated scrotums
filled with nothing but bad dreams
and scores to settle.
As their rogue girths occupy seats of power, they chomp
greedy handfuls of a fragmented planet, rejoice in its demise,
cheer for signs of the end times, with ravenous eyes riveted to scenes of suffering pregnant and nursing mothers—their pornography of choice--
then wipe their mouths and say they’ve done nothing wrong.
It’s as if they have forgotten the ancient text’s report,
that it was a pregnant woman who first held
the Prince of Peace,
kept him safe in her womb
and nourished at her breasts.
Have I forgotten the peacemaker’s heritage, which would be like
forgetting my own name?
St Francis famously prayed to be an instrument or channel of peace, and I know, I know, I KNOW there are times I’ve behaved like
an absolute tool of division and bitterness;
an implement of derision rather than
a conduit of harmony and grace, seasoned with
discernment and aimed with precision.
My friends—those of you who’ve witnessed or
been in the wake of my recklessness,
when I’ve wielded the gavel of karmic vengeance
in the prideful delusion that it belonged in my hand,
I ask your forgiveness,
and to those who seek or have sought mine,
know that it is yours—
now, days, weeks, years ago—please receive it.
Let us, right here, in the sight of one another and our collective ancestors,
throw off the encumbrance of guilt and shame, and embrace
in steadfast tenderness, peace
like a precious baby upon whom the blessed fate of the whole world rests—
give our full attention, hold it close, steward it well.
This peace, though often only a tangible substance
found in faith’s realm of the unseen,
promises to not leave or forsake us,
graces us with the conviction to stop turning our backs,
the comfort and courage to stop hiding our faces,
so that if we are to be thorns,
only to be thorns in the side
of resignation’s piteous abandonment of hope.
So yes, we must bring forth our witness.
We must deliver our testimony.
Then somewhere along this alpha and omega continuum
and shimmering far beyond us in the spectrum of all that is eternally good,
we will be the instruments of peace staking out its most fruitful territory.
Peace is victorious. Peace shall reign.
Peace be with you.
Sandra K. King 2023
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