After the election...

I am grateful - and relieved - that the President was re-elected.  His values more deeply reflect my own and his vision of shared sacrifice on behalf of the common good rings true to my commitment to God and country.  To be sure, we would have endured another choice. We've been through slavery and apartheid, the fight for women's suffrage, war and McCarthyism, too.  But I'm thankful we won't have to fight those retrograde battles now - just ones that move us forward.

That said, it appears it is going to snow tonight.  So today I've been moved by the poem by Pablo Neruda that strikes the right chord within for me - maybe you, too.

Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth
let's not speak in any language,
let's stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.
It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines,
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.

Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.
Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victory with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.

If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.

Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.