My wish for you
Is that you continue
Continue
To be who and how you are
To astonish a mean world
With your acts of kindness
Continue
Maya
Angelou (full poem at end)
_______________________________________________
If ever there was a time for persistence
It is now
For this is a time when it often feels
As if we are
Collectively
Stumbling from failure to failure
And it feels, deep down
As if no matter what we do
No matter how hard we try
No matter what skills and resources we bring to the task
We cannot stop the world from imploding
We feel like “hollow [people]”
And the words echo like a drum beat
“This is the way world ends
This is the way
world ends
This is the way
world ends
Not with bang but
a whimper” (TS Eliot)
And so it is difficult to continue
To continue to do the hard work of love and compassion in
a world that values power and wealth
To continue to speak of grace in world that demands merit
To continue to stand for truth, when lies are not just
accepted but shared
When cruelty is gleefully applauded and seen as strength
When greed and corruption are simply, “how it works”, the
“art of the deal”
Some mornings
As the darkness lingers
And the rain (or snow) falls and the winter winds howl
It seems foolish
to continue
even on the first day of a new year
a new decade
there is that voice that whispers
it is useless
nothing will change
and there is a sense of dread instead of expectation
as we look forward through a wilderness that
that stretches on forever, onto a path that has no end
and one feels, hollow
And yet
We must continue
For we are Sacred children
We carry divine DNA
Sacred presence
And we must continue to be those
In whom the Sacred works
Through whom the Sacred works
(as foolish as that might seem)
And so we must continue
We must get up, and put one foot in front of the other
We must breathe deeply
We must awaken to the love that dwells with in
And continue
To protect the planet
To fight poverty and inequity
To work for peace
Continue
To fight corruption
To value, accept, welcome, include ALL people
We must continue
“To be who how [we] are
To astonish a mean world
With our acts of kindness
Let us not become weary in doing good,
for at the proper time we will reap a harvest
if we do not give up (Galatians 6:9)
________________________________________________
By Maya Angelou
My wish for you
Is that you continue
Continue
To be who and how you are
To astonish a mean world
With your acts of kindness
Continue
To allow humor to lighten the burden
Of your tender heart
Continue
In a society dark with cruelty
To let the people hear the grandeur
Of God in the peals of your laughter
Continue
To let your eloquence
Elevate the people to heights
They had only imagined
Continue
To remind the people that
Each is as good as the other
And that no one is beneath
Nor above you
Continue
To remember your own young years
And look with favor upon the lost
And the least and the lonely
Continue
To put the mantle of your protection
Around the bodies of
The young and defenseless
Continue
To take the hand of the despised
And diseased and walk proudly with them
In the high street
Some might see you and
Be encouraged to do likewise
Continue
To plant a public kiss of concern
On the cheek of the sick
And the aged and infirm
And count that as a
Natural action to be expected
Continue
To let gratitude be the pillow
Upon which you kneel to
Say your nightly prayer
And let faith be the bridge
You build to overcome evil
And welcome good
Continue
To ignore no vision
Which comes to enlarge your range
And increase your spirit
Continue
To dare to love deeply
And risk everything
For the good thing
Continue
To float
Happily in the sea of infinite substance
Which set aside riches for you
Before you had a name
Continue
And by doing so
You and your work
Will be able to continue
Eternally
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