we sat on the grass
on the steps
stood, leaned
waited –
some brought chairs for
the elderly, the frail
we came with empty hands,
old wounds and words
that burned holes in our tongues
and kept us silent for years,
we came with new ideas
and shared concerns
we came with love –
we gathered because it is time
because there is a child
on the street corner
who says she is hungry and
her mother has passed
and if it will take
a village to raise this child
we have gathered to be that village –
build a village from our broken past.
we have gathered because
there is a future that calls us
to be here together –
now.
and the blue clouds
heavy with promise
held their rain until
the talking ended.
and the late sun
broke the dark horizon –
bathed us in gold,
skin and leaf
and grass seed alike
illuminated us
momentarily
in the light
we are
becoming.
Linking to Earthweal’s weekly challenge: The Swan
https://earthweal.com/2022/01/24/earthweal-weekly-challenge-the-swan/
fresh poetry 
Compacts are formed in sacred trusts like this, between a people and a land, between what we must do and what nature does best. This so reminds me of lines one of Wendell Berry’s Sabbaths poems:
There are two healings: nature’s
and ours and nature’s. Nature’s
will come in spite of us after us,
over the graves of its masters, as it comes
to the forsaken fields. The healing
that is ours and nature’s will come
if we are willing, if we are patient,
if we know the way, if we do the work.
How can the work not be fruitful, surrendered and dedicated so? I don’t know if this is a real or imaginary community meetings – works either way – but if real boots are on the ground, keep us informed. It’s so necessary to the weal – B
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Thanks Brendan. I love love love this Wendell Berry extract and it is so very pertinent to our time. And yes this was a very real boots on the ground meeting yesterday evening – though these are not the official minutes 😉 It is an immensely positive project and a very powerful thing to have a community rally around a shared vision. And it is early days still and a lot to be done – but it feels achievable.
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Wonderful. Keep us informed. (PS, the book by Berry is “A Timbered Choir: Sabbath Poems 1979-99” and it collects poems he wrote on the Sabbath, out in the sanctum of the woods. Berry has kept a family farmed for 50 years in Kentucky, so sabbaths are the day to join his work with nature’s.
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I will look for it. I have enjoyed many of his poems and essays.
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What a wonderful moment of hope. (K)
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This is beautiful Lindi. (I have sent you an email about book writing too) 🙂
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Thanks. (And will have a look)
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