When the snow ceases at long last to fall –
Though few remain long enough to ever know –
The sky at long last clears of clouded shroud,
The stars beyond at long last revealed once more,
And it’s late as the moon rises,
Formidable yet waning down over the new-fallen snow.
How now do we find ourselves,
Neither asleep nor properly dreaming,
Though distinctions may melt away under gibbous glow
So late of hour?
Two moons we’ve seen,
Two moons of this new year that’s hardly yet begun;
Hardly yet begun yet two moons deep.
Not yet rolling,
But no longer standing still.
Choral stars singing
Of all that which we must face –
Maybe we manage to hum along.
And as that humble, tragic, pretty, catchy little tune
Starts to finish and then begin again,
We might pause to wonder what exactly it is
That we could ask for.
We might well ask…
Well, we might just ask…
That joy which is our birthright,
May it be found in our very steps,
May it spring forth like rays of light from our minds,
May it gather round us as some small measure of protection –
And, not least of all,
May it manifest itself as grace.
The tune is still going,
May we seek it, may we hear it,
May we connect with it and delight in it.
And even as we know that oppression,
That familiar and multifaceted oppression,
That fiery, scorching, treacherous oppression,
May we bear its brunt as little as is necessary,
Perhaps, we ask, may we bear it less in our persons,
That we may have strength remaining after
To yet carry out the work of the just and the right.
That which we must bear, however,
May we prove able to bear it,
And may we bear it alongside the retention of grace and joy.
And may smiling alpacas be waiting to greet us at the end of all our journeys.
Christopher J. DiLoreto 