I Hide My Chocolate

May We Go On

I understand anger. Kill them all! I feel anger.

I understand fear. Don’t go there! I feel fear.

I understand despair. There is no hope! I feel despair.

More than anything, I feel despair.

What now? How do we make sense of another 129 people dead? How do we go on?

I’ve gotten used to saying good-bye in the morning, after 9/11, whispering I love you, and wondering. Will I come home tonight? Will you? I no longer have burning ambition for my life. I am okay. What will be will be.

But I am heart-broken for my children. I want them to want to travel. I want them to want to change the world. I want them to want to bring children into the world. But what world is this?

The hatred is palpable. Why do they hate us so much? Why do we hate them so much? Why is there us and them? Aren’t we all human beings living on Earth? The last I read, there is very little DNA difference between us and chimps and virtually no difference between us and them.

If we kill them, they will kill us back and then we will kill them back and then they will kill us back. Is that what it will take? The apocalypse? We will kill ourselves. And our Earth.

More than anything, I feel despair.

I sympathize with the angry warmongers. But I want to believe the spiritual leaders who tell us to pray. For that is all I can do today. Pray for Paris. Pray for us. Pray for them. Pray for love. Pray for peace. Pray for my children and their children and their children and their children. May we go on.

“later that night

i held an atlas in my lap

ran my fingers across the whole world

and whispered

where does it hurt?

 

it answered

everywhere

everywhere

everywhere.”

 

― Warsan Shire

Image Credit:  World Map in Orange and Blue by Michael Tompsett