[Dialogue] aahhh, how to respond to those we love

[Sunny Walker]

As Jim pointed out, I've dealt already with my mother, a sweet woman, soon to be 80, who doesn't always read the emails from her more (dare I say rabid?) Texas Republican relatives before forwarding.

These days, I am still finding Mary Oliver's "Wage Peace" to be the most helpful.  Sunny

Wage Peace
by Mary Oliver

Wage peace with your breath.

Breathe in firemen and rubble,
breathe out whole buildings
and flocks of blackbirds.

Breathe in terrorists and breathe out sleeping children
and freshly mown fields.

Breathe in confusion and breathe out maple trees.

Breathe in the fallen
and breathe out lifelong friendships intact.

Wage peace with your listening:
hearing sirens, pray loud.

Remember your tools:
flower seeds, clothes pins, clean rivers.

Make soup.

Learn to knit and make a hat.

Think of chaos as dancing raspberries,
imagine grief as the outbreath of beauty
or the gesture of fish.

Swim for the other side.

Wage peace.

Never has the world seemed so fresh and precious.

Have a cup of tea and rejoice.
Act as if armistice has already arrived.
Don't wait another minute.