Today We Pause

 Today We Pause

 

Today, we remember those who laid down their lives for our democracy

our way of life, and Eleanor Roosevelt comes to mind.

She said, “You Must Do The Thing That You Cannot Do.”

I’m wearing the shirt with that statement, in my mind, and looking out my window on this rainy morning, thinking about how the garden was a huge sacrifice

Much of my youth was spent pulling weeds, back-breaking work with little yield and much cost.

Now I appreciate the wildflowers fending for themselves with their steely determination.

The way they endure, while vicious and self-serving predators

concerned only with enriching themselves,

bark at and devour what they conceive as low-hanging fruit.

Anyone or anything that refuses to bend to their will.

Lives that mean nothing to them or their cronies.

Lives that sacrificed everything for liberty, GOD, and country

Honorable men and women who served

so that they could climb the ladder of success without so much as a turn of the head or a thank-you. The craven who claims his own orbit.

As if they deserved it. And we didn’t. 

Predators who trample the garden amidst those who continue to tend it, as if all that destruction never happened. The sustaining survivors, rebuilding, sacrificing, sowing hope from tiny seeds. So that we may bring a measure of joy to those who cannot.  The ones who paid and continue to pay, slaving and bowing, and hoping for reason, justice, and sanity.