Sunday, October 6, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] we need to look inward into our own pain, our own
loss, our own suffering, and see where we can heal. And
by healing ourselves, then we can truly be who we are,
which I believe is a complete gift to the world. [. . .]
~ Kalyanee Mam
________________________________________
 
Quoted from "Documenting Shifting Landscapes: A Conversation with Kalyanee Mam," Emergence Magazine, September 5, 2024; Online (Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee interviewed Mam at Emergence Magazine's exhibition "Shifting Landscapes." The conversation was recorded live. A transcript is available at the link.)
 
Kalyanee Mam, Cambodian-American Filmmaker

Sunday, September 29, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] Prayer is a sweeping of forgetfulness, because it
is an honoring of remembrance. It is an affirmation,
and an affirmation is more powerful than negation.[. . .]
~ Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee
____________________________________

Quoted from "Memory, Praise, and Spirit: A Talk by Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee" (Keynote at Conference on Spiritual Ecology and Peace-Building, St. Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace, London), Emergence Magazine, August 29, 2024; Online (The talk is available at the link as both podcast and transcript.)

Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Sufi Teacher and Filmmaker; Founder and Executive Editor, Emergence Magazine

Sunday, September 22, 2024

Thought for the Day

The betrayal of a belief is not the same thing
as ceasing to believe.
~ James Baldwin
_________________________________

Quoted from James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son (Beacon Press,  2012)

James Baldwin (August 2, 1924 - December 1, 1987), American Writer, Novelist, Essayist, Playwright, Poet; Civil Rights Activist

Sunday, September 15, 2024

Thought for the Day

Getting old is the second-biggest surprise of my life,
but the first, by a mile, is our unceasing need for deep
attachment and intimate love.
~ Roger Angell
__________________________
 
Quoted from "This Old Man" in The New Yorker, February 9, 2014; Online 

Roger Angell (September 19, 1920 - May 20, 2022), American Sports Essayist Specializing in Baseball; Senior Fiction Editor, The New Yorker
 
Roger Angell Obituary at The New York Times

Guide to the Roger Angell Papers, National Baseball Hall of Fame

Sunday, September 8, 2024

Thought for the Day

We don't need anniversaries for things
we can never forget.
~ Diane Foley
_________________________________

Quoted from Diane Foley, "Jim Foley's Legacy Helped Change Hostage Policy," Guest Essay/Opinion, The New York Times, August 18, 2024; online

Diane Foley, Mother of American Journalist James Foley; Founder, James Foley Foundation; Co-Author (with Colum McCann) of American Mother

James Foley (October 18, 1973 - August 19, 2014)

Sunday, September 1, 2024

Thought for the Day

Receptivity without confrontation leads to a bland neutrality
that serves nobody. Confrontation without receptivity leads
to an oppressive aggression which hurts everybody.
~ Henri J. M. Nouwen
 
__________________________________
 
Quoted from Henri J.M. Nouwen, Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life (Image Books, 1966), p. 99  (This quote also appears in David Brooks, How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen (Random House, 2023), p. 259.)

David Brooks, Writer, Author, Political and Cultural Commentator

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Catholic Priest, Spiritual Writer

Henri Nouwen Society

Sunday, August 25, 2024

Thought for the Day

When your instinct is to avoid or deny, you must
not look away.

When you're inclined to false hope or good cheer,
choose sincerity and quiet presence.

When you think you have all the answers,
ask a question.
~ Sharon Brous

____________________________________

Quoted from Sharon Brous, The Amen Effect: Ancient Wisdom to Mend Our Broken Hearts and World (Avery/Penguin Random House, 2024), p. 146

Sharon Brous, Founding and Senior Rabbi, IKAR; Writer

Sharon Brous, "It's Time to Reclaim Religion," 2016 TedTalk

Sunday, August 18, 2024

Thought for the Day

Tragedy teaches that no one should die
with a clear conscience.
~ Robert D. Kaplan
_________________________________

Quoted from Robert D. Kaplan, "The Burden of Power Is Overwhelming" (Chapter 9) in The Tragic Mind: Fear, Fate, and the Burden of Power (Yale University Press, 2023), p. 84

Robert D. Kaplan, Robert Strausz-Hupe Chair in Geopolitics, Foreign Policy Research Institute; Reporter, Writer, Author, Essayist, Speechwriter

Sunday, August 11, 2024

Thought for the Day

Silence is somehow at the very foundation of all reality.
It is that out of which all being comes and to which all things return.
~ Fr. Richard Rohr
________________________________
 
Quoted from Richard Rohr, "The Gift of Silence" (Daily Meditation: Prayerful Rhythm of Life), July 1, 2024

Fr. Richard Rohr, Franciscan Friar, Ecumenical Teacher; Founder, Center for Action and Contemplation; Author
 

Sunday, August 4, 2024

Thought for the Day

Most often the alchemy that produces a poem or a work
of fiction is hidden within the work itself, if not embedded
in the coiling ridges of the mind. [. . .]
 
[. . .] Why do we write? [. . .]
Because we cannot simply live.
~ Patty Smith
_________________________________
 
Quoted from Patti Smith, Devotion ("Why I Write Series"), 2016 Windham-Campbell Lecture (Yale University Press, 2017), pages 27, 93
 
 Patti Smith, Singer-Songwriter, Poet and Author, Painter, Photographer
 

Sunday, July 28, 2024

Thought for the Day

Nature doesn't disdain what lives only for a day.
It pours the whole of itself into each moment.
~ Tom Stoppard
_________________________________
 
Quoted from Playwright Tom Stoppard's Shipwreck (Part II of The Coast of Utopia), Reprinted by Grove Press, 2003

Tom Stoppard, Playwright and Screenwriter

Sunday, July 21, 2024

Thought for the Day

We must take the feeling of being at home into exile.
We must be rooted in the absence of place.
~ Simone Weil
_______________________________
 
Quoted from Simone Weil, Gravity & Grace (Bison, 1997), Trans. Arthur Wills

Simone Weil (1909-1943), French Philosopher, Writer, Political Activist, Religious Mystic

See Simone Weil's Gravity & Grace at The Anarchist Library.

Sunday, July 14, 2024

Thought for the Day

The real gift of doing the work is getting to do it alongside
writers you admire, and to share some decoration with them
is an added joyful bonus.
~ Hanif Abdurraqib
_______________________

Quoted from Hanif Abdurraqib's Statement on Being Awarded Campbell-Windam Literature Prize, Nonfiction, 2024
 
Hanif Abdurraqib, American Writer, Essayist, and Poet; Podcaster, "Object of Sound"

Campbell-Windam Prizes

Sunday, July 7, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] The shameless shall inherit the earth,
while the blameless grapple with the mess they make of it.
~ Frank Bruni 
_________________________________

Quoted from Frank Bruni, "There is apparently no accountability – ever – for Donald Trump" (Opinion), The New York Times, July 4, 2024
 
Frank Bruni, American Journalist, Author, Contributing Writer for The New York Times
 

Sunday, June 30, 2024

Thought for the Day

Everything is capable of a once upon a time, [. . .]
Lauren Camp
 
________________________________

Quoted from Lauren Camp, "Lecture on Nothing" in An Eye In Each Square (River River Books, 2023), p. 72

Lauren Camp, Prize-Winning Poet; Poet Laureate of New Mexico; Instructor, Poetry Out Loud New Mexico; Senior Fellow, Black Earth Institute; Visual Artist


Sunday, June 23, 2024

Thought for the Day

To reread a beloved book after a long time away is always
a great risk. [. . .] for a book that is more than merely a favorite,
a book that has a hand in creating you, the risk of loss is even
greater. [. . .] if you were to lose that book, you would feel that
you had lost some necessary part of yourself. [. . .]
~ Margaret Renkl
___________________________________

Quoted from Margaret Renkl, "I Reread a Book That Changed My Life, but I'd Changed, Too," The New York Times, June 3, 2024; Online

Margaret Renkl, Prize-Winning Writer and Author; Contributing Opinion Writer, The New York Times; Founding Editor, Chapter 16


Sunday, June 16, 2024

Thought for the Day

If I play you a piece of music,
that's when you can truly look inside me.
~ Hans Zimmer
___________________________
 
Quoted from Transcript of Stephen Galloway Interview with Hans Zimmer at The Hollywood Reporter, November 3, 2014; Online. Also see Hans Zimmer Quotes at QuoteFancy.

Hans Zimmer, Prolific and Influential German-born American Composer and Music Producer

 

Hans Zimmer on FaceBook and  Instagram

Sunday, June 9, 2024

Thought for the Day

Flowers are made to seduce the senses: fragrance, form, colour.

If you cannot be seduced by beauty, you cannot learn
the wisdom of ugliness.
~ H.D.
___________________________________

Quoted from H.D., "Notes on Thoughts and Vision" in Visions and Ecstasies (David Zwirner Books, 2019), p. 28

H.D. (1886-1961), American Poet, Novelist, Memoirist, Essayist, Critic, Writer of Children's Books, and Translator

Note: H.D. was the pen name of Hilda Doolittle.


Sunday, June 2, 2024

Thought for the Day

We look at the world once, in childhood. /
The rest is memory.
~ Louise Gluck
____________________________

Quoted from Louise Gluck, "Nostos" in Meadowlands (Ecco/HarperCollins, 1996), p. 43

Louise Gluck (1943-2023), American Poet and Essayist; Winner, 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature; U.S. Poet Laureate, 2003-2004



Sunday, May 26, 2024

Thought for the Day

You change the world and yourself by changing
your thoughts. And first, you change yourself. And
then maybe you change the world. And then maybe
you help somebody else in their moment of great
despair – or their moment of great joy.
~ Jane Hirshfield
__________________________________

Quoted from "Ezra Klein Interviews Jane Hirshfield: What a Poetic Mind Can Teach Us About How to Live" (Online Transcript from The Ezra Klein Show at The New York Times), March 3, 2023

Jane Hirshfield, Poet, Essayist, Translator

Jane Hirshfield Profiles at Academy of American Poets and Poetry Foundation

Jane Hirshfield on FaceBook

Sunday, May 19, 2024

I'm seeing humanity as at the mouth
of a very long dark tunnel, and right
at the end is a little star – that's hope.
~ Jane Goodall 
_____________________________

Quoted from Ralph Blumenthal, "What's Next for Jane Goodall? An Immersive Spectacle in Tanzania" at The New York Times, April 9, 2024; Online (Subscription Required)

Jane Goodall (1934 – ), Primatologist, Environmental Activist; Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire; United Nations Messenger of Peace; "Dr. Jane's Dream" at Arusha Cultural Heritage Center, Tanzania


Roots & Shoots (for Youth)

Sunday, May 12, 2024

Thought for the Day

Sunrise [. . .] is a state of the heart.
Sunrise is the space where nighttime fears
move aside for hope, where we feel peace
about our mortality in the scope of the universal
truth that love abides.
~ Becca Stevens
 
___________________________
 
Quoted from Becca Stevens, Letters from the Farm: A Simple Path for a Deeper Spiritual Life (New York: Morehouse Publishing, 2015), pp. 24-25, 29
 
Becca Stevens, Priest; Author; Social Entrepreneur; Founder, Thistle Farms

Sunday, May 5, 2024

Thought for the Day

History says, don't hope / On  this side of the grave. /
But then, once in a lifetime / The longed-for tidal wave /
Of justice can rise up, / And hope and history rhyme.
~ Seamus Heaney
_______________________

Quoted from Seamus Heaney, The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles' Philoctetes (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1991 (Reprint Ed.)

Seamus Heaney (1939-2013), Irish Poet, Playwright; Recipient, Nobel Prize in Literature, 1995

Biography at The Nobel Prize

Sunday, April 28, 2024

Thought for the Day

We need art to explore the darkest recesses of our lives and minds.
But we also need art to tell us why this world is
worth loving, and therefore saving.
~ Christian Wiman
___________________________

Quoted from Christian Wiman, "The Poet of Light" (Essay) in The New York Times, January 12, 2018 (Online)

Christian Wiman, Poet, Essayist, Translator, Editor, Author; Clement-Muehl Professor of Communication Arts, Yale Divinity School; Former Editor, Poetry Magazine

Sunday, April 21, 2024

Thought for the Day

What songs are audible when the wind stops?
What has been kept alive in the time snatched from work
and sheltered from ongoing destruction – what moments
of recognition, what ways of relating, what other
imagined worlds, what other selves? 
What other kinds of time?
~ Jenny Odell on 'Vertical' Time
__________________________________

Quoted from Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, "Another Kind of Time: An Interview with Jenny Odell" at Emergence Magazine (Online Transcript), April 25, 2023

Jenny Odell, Multidisciplinary Artist, Writer, and Educator. Odell's most recent books are Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock (2023), Inhabiting the Negative Space (2021), and How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy (2019).

Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Filmmaker, Naqshbandi Sufi Teacher, Spiritual Ecologist; Founder, Podcast Host, and Executive Editor, Emergence Magazine

Sunday, April 14, 2024

Thought for the Day

When we see the smoke and flames on the horizon
are we seeing not just a fire but a reflection
of our own voracious appetites and desire
to consume until we're finally extinguished?
~ Jeffrey T. Manuel on John Vaillant's 'Fire Weather'
__________________________________

Quoted from Jeffrey T. Manuel, "Our Neighbo(u)rs to the North, Aflame: On John Vaillant's 'Fire Weather'," in Cleveland Review of Books, March 12, 2024

John Vaillant, American-Canadian Nonfiction Writer, Journalist, and Novelist
 
Jeffrey T. Manuel, Historian on Energy, Technology, and the Environment; Professor of History, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville; Writer and Author

Sunday, April 7, 2024

Thought for the Day

The most practical thing you can do,
even in hard times, is to lead with curiosity,
lead with respect, work hard to understand
the people you might be taught to detest.
~ David Brooks
__________________________________

David Brooks, "How to Stay Sane in Brutalizing Times," The New York Times, November 2, 2023

David Brooks, Author and New York Times Opinion Columnist on Politics, Culture, and the Social Sciences

Sunday, March 31, 2024

Thought for the Day

Nobody will give you freedom . . .
you have to take it.
~ Meret Oppenheim 

______________________________________

Quoted from Meret Oppenheim, Acceptance Speech, City of Basel Art Award, 1975

Meret Oppenheim (1913-1975), Swiss Artist, Photographer, Poet

Note: See The Loveliest Vowel Empties: Collected Poems of Meret Oppenheim, trans. Kathleen Heil (World Poetry Books, February 2023).

Sunday, March 24, 2024

Thought for the Day

Love is convinced that it is the source of life,
and life is convinced that without it, love is
nothing. And in fact, nonhuman life on Earth,
which is most life, has no need for love. Love
is necessary for humans, because without it 
we are destroyers of worlds, and with it, we
still struggle not to be destroyers.
~ Fady Joudah
__________________________________

Quoted from Aria Aber, "Fady Joudah: The poet on the war in Gaza changed his work" in The Yale Review, February 28, 2024 (Online)

Fady Joudah, Award-Winning Palestinian-American Poet, Writer, Translator, Co-Founder/Co-Editor, Etel Adnan Poetry Prize, Physician in Internal Medicine

Wednesday, March 20, 2024

Flour Massacre (Poem)

 Flour Massacre

        This bag of flour [. . .] it's
            the most expensive food ever made.
            ~ Mohammed al-Simry, father of four


On Leap Year Day, aid trucks at last
arrive, and the crowd, having gathered
in al-Rashid Street the night before,
makes for the goods.
 
 
Once, what came before the trucks
with their sacks of flour, 
before the bread to be baked
and then heaped with hummus,  
 
before the fattoush salad,
the soups of lentils and fava beans,
the eggs or chicken,
the copper pitchers of sous,
 
was the anticipation of taste,
the clarity of a satisfied stomach,
eyes delighting at the sight
of knafeh and date-filled ma'mool


It is four forty-five a.m.,
the morning of February 29,
and the trucks arrive.

So, too, do the soldiers.
Look: they are anywhere,
even everywhere, 
the aid trucks are.

But these soldiers,
they make no exceptions
for the food-deprived.
They feel the hunger.


Dropped sacks of flour
dust the heads  
of hundreds, there
in al-Rashid Street.

No one clamors now
for bread. 
No bread
will be made this day.

_______________________________________

For articles on the event that has come to be known as the "Flour Massacre," see Zaina Arafat's essay "Fasting for Ramadan While Gaza Goes Hungry" (The New Yorker, March 11, 2024) and Simon Speakman Cordall, Mohammed R Mhawish, and Mat Nashed's reporting, "When Israeli Soldiers Shot at Hungry Palestinians" (Aljazeera News, March 5, 2024).

Fattoush is a type of Middle Eastern (Lebanese) chopped salad that uses, among other ingredients, pomegranate molasses, sumac and other herbs, mixed greens and vegetables, and toasted pita chips.

Sous, or erk sous, is a licorice drink typically imbibed during Ramadan.

Knafeh is a cheese-filled sweet made with filo dough and ma'mool are sweet cookies, often stuffed with dates.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Thought for the Day

I think self-promotion is a really bad idea for
a couple of reasons – the greatest of which is 
that you start thinking that public attention is
how you know your work is good. Applause and acclaim
 are not how you know something has quality.
~ Scott Cairns
_____________________________

Quoted from Ben Palpant, "A Conversation with Scott Cairns" (Online), The Rabbit Room, February 26, 2024

Scott Cairns, Poet, Spiritual Writer and Memoirist; Professor of English and Director, M.F.A. in Creative Writing, Seattle University; Blogger and Podcaster

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] We must learn how to be surprised,
not to adjust ourselves. [. . .]
~ Abraham Joshua Heschel
____________________________

Quoted in Tali Sharot and Cass R. Sunstein, "Why People Fail to Notice Horrors Around Them" (Guest Essay), The New York Times, February 25, 2024

Dr. Tali Sharot, Neuroscientist, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London and Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Cass R. Sunstein, Law Professor, Harvard University; Founder and Director, Program on Behavioral Economics and Public Policy, Harvard Law School


Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), Jewish Theologian and Philosopher; Author

Arnold Eisen, "The Spiritual Audacity of Abraham Joshua Heschel" at On Being, September 21,  1917

Sunday, March 3, 2024

Thought for the Day

The correct response to uncertainty is mythmaking.
~ Martin Shaw
_______________________________

Quoted from Martin Shaw, "Navigating the Mysteries," Emergence, May 12, 2022

Dr. Martin Shaw, Mythologist and Storyteller; Author, Translator and Poet

 
Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, "Mud and Antler Bone: An Interview with Martin Shaw," Emergence, June 4, 2018

Saturday, March 2, 2024

The Children / We See (Poem)

 The Children / We See

            What childhood does /
            a destroyed childhood beget?
                    ~ Fady Joudah
 
We see them –
the children
rummaging through the fallen
fortress that once was Gaza
 
Their urge –
to eat, sleep, play
to wake as if free
like the kites
they fly in hope
their dreams
of so many seeds
their grandfathers sowed
when the land was theirs
to harvest
and they could
taste the white cucumbers
the figs and the olives
Battiri eggplant, gourds
with necks like swans'

These children –
we see them
what they've become
ghost-eaters
dirt-diggers
what they would give
for a taste of khubeezeh
a drink of cold water
a wash in the Red Sea

They push their steel pots
their plastic bowls
to the front lines
their eyes on those
with the stronger arms
the longer reach
the elbows out and ready
 
They are children –
we see them
know what they teach us
what war does
how power takes
on a life of its own
delivering back
their small bodies
into the arms of their fathers
borne too early of their mothers
denied them

__________________________

The epigraph is from Fady Joudah's poem "[. . .]."

Khubeezeh, as locally known in Gaza, is cheeseweed. It has become, according to the United Nations, a major food source for Gazans. A plant, it typically has been used in recipes for side dishes.

Sunday, February 25, 2024

Thought for the Day

Hope is a song in a weary throat.
~ Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray
_____________________________

Quoted from Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray, Verse 8, Dark Testament and Other Poems (Liveright Publishing Corp./W.W. Norton, 2018)

Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray (1910-1985), Lawyer/Legal Scholar,  Poet, Episcopal Priest, Civil Rights Activist
 
Pauli Murray Center, Durham, North Carolina 


Note: On February 22, 2024, the U.S. Mint released the new Pauli Murray quarter. (See American Women Quarters Program.)

Listen to Murray's Dark Testament, Verse 8 at SoundCloud.

Sunday, February 18, 2024

Thought for the Day

We ask of writers what we ask of our friends,
to help us mediate and interpret the world.
~ Hosam Zowa in My Friends
___________________________________

Quoted from Hisham Matar, My Friends (Random House, 2024)

Hisham Matar, Award-Winning Novelist, Memoirist, and Essayist; Fellow, Royal Society of Literature; Associate Professor, Professional Practice in Comparative Literature, Asia and Middle East Cultures, and English, Barnard College, Columbia University

Sunday, February 11, 2024

Thought for the Day

What is the worth of defending our lives
if we do not seek to protect the lives of others?
~ Viet Thanh Nguyen
__________________________________

Quoted from Viet Thanh Nguyen, "Palestine Is in Asia: An Asian American Argument for Solidarity" in The Nation, January 29, 2024

Viet Thanh Nguyen, Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Comparative Literature, University of Southern California; Novelist; Fiction and Nonfiction Writer; Editor; Winner, 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

Sunday, February 4, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] the truest thing about being human
– the thing deepest down in us –
is not sin but the divine image.
~ Barbara Brown Taylor
_____________________________

Quoted from Isaac Anderson, "A Conversation with Barbara Brown Taylor" in Image, Issue 97; Online Archive

Barbara Brown Taylor, Episcopal Priest, Teacher, Writer and Author

Barbara Brown Taylor on FaceBook

Sunday, January 28, 2024

Thought for the Day

Finding time for anything that matters
will always be a challenge. [. . .] 
~ Margaret Renkl
______________________________________

Quoted from Margaret Renkl, "The Nicest New Year's Resolution I Ever Made," The New York Times, November 21, 2021

Margaret Renkl, Writer, Author, Essayist, Contributing Opinion Writer for The New York Times; Founding Editor, Chapter 16, Humanities Tennessee

Sunday, January 21, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] How lovely 
it would be to become something
that cannot be contained; to become
something so present, yet so far out
of reach that no man even thinks of trying
to lay his hands on it.
~ Tariq Luthun
_____________________________

Quoted from Tariq Luthun, "I Felt Nothing" in How the Water Holds Me (Bull City Press, 2019), p. 25

Tariq Luthun, Detroit, Michigan-born Poet; Kresge Arts in Detroit Fellow; Community Organizer, Data Consultant

Sunday, January 14, 2024

Thought for the Day

[...] what is more generous than a window?
~ Pat Schneider
 
_______________________________
 
Quoted from "The Patience of Ordinary Things" by Pat Schneider in Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems, Phyllis Cole-Dai and Ruby R. Wilson, Eds. (Grayson Books, 2017), p. 33
 
Pat Schneider (1934-2020), American Poet and Writer
 
Susan Bruns Rowe, "A Profile of Pat Schneider" at Literary Mama, March/April 2021

 

Monday, January 8, 2024

Gaza Funeral (Poem)

 
The lucky are those who have someone
        to bury them when they die.
            ~ Doctor in Gaza 


The too-short truce was all the time
they had to bury the dead boy lying
 
in their rubbled apartment. Already
they'd waited four days, the body
 
of their 10-year-old wrapped in
a blanket providing no warmth,
 
his last rites un-mouthed, never
to be heard amid the later bombings.
 
On the fifth day, hurrying past
the broken skeletons of neighbors'
 
burned buildings, the father spied
the guava tree that children used
 
to climb for its juicy, sweet fruits.
In the sand, giving way to the fallen
 
harvest, the father dug a shallow
grave and left his boy to sleep.
 
________________________________
 
The epigraph and some details for this poem come from Raja Abdulrahim's article, "As Gaza Losses Mount Under Strikes, Dignified Burials Are Another Casualty" in The New York Times, January 6, 2024.

Sunday, January 7, 2024

Thought for the Day

[. . .] Light needs such quiet, gentle work.
~ Benjamin Cutler
__________________________

Quoted from Benjamin Cutler, "An Invitation to Light" (This is the concluding line of Cutler's poem, which was published in The Shore in 2019, and, more recently, included in the Advent Project, Day 15, December 15, 2023, of Biola University's Center for Christianity, Culture &  the Arts.)

Benjamin Cutler, Poet; English Instructor, Swain County High School, North Carolina